The Panthers and 49ers both come into their Week 8 matchup on a roll. Carolina has won four straight after starting out the season 0-2, and San Francisco is undefeated at 6-0.
To find out more about what the 49ers have been doing, we spoke with Kyle Madson, managing editor of Niners Wire. Here are five questions he answered about his team:
Panthers Wire: The 49ers gave Jimmy Garoppolo a big extension in February, but his numbers don’t look great. What’s going on at QB?
Niners Wire: San Francisco’s landed on a winning formula where they ride their scorching hot defense (10 points allowed in the last three weeks), and hold on to the ball with their deep, diverse rushing attack. The lack of production from Garoppolo comes a little bit from a lack of necessity. He just has to convert third downs and deliver in crunch time, which he did with a game-winning touchdown pass against the Steelers with 1:15 left (in Week 3).
On the other hand, part of the reason I think the 49ers aren’t throwing a ton is because I don’t think head coach Kyle Shanahan all the way trusts his quarterback. There are still too many head-scratching throws or bad reads. Garoppolo is good for three to five tosses each game that don’t make a ton of sense.
Rather than risk more of those throws, Shanahan simply relies on the run game to hold leads. We’ll see what happens when San Francisco trails by more than seven — something they’ve yet to do this season.
PW: Can Kyle Shanahan fix what’s wrong with Garoppolo, or do you think he’ll have to coach around it?
NW: I think he already is a little bit. He’s reined in the passing attack that won Matt Ryan an MVP in 2016, and instead he’s trying to get Garoppolo some easier throws in the short-to-intermediate passing game. His numbers aren’t that bad, though. He’s at a 68.3 percent completion rate and nearly 8.0 yards per attempt. The biggest problem are those ill-advised throws into tight coverage and misreads. If Shanahan can get Garoppolo to eliminate those handful of throws, this offense will hit a new, more dangerous level.
PW: Talk about Nick Bosa. What makes him so disruptive?
NW: He’s just a baller, man. He’s so strong, and so quick off the ball and so good with his hands — there just aren’t a lot of ways opposing tackles can slow him down. Bosa is also an exceptionally smart player, so shutting him down or attacking him the same way twice rarely works.
Teams are going to start figuring out that one player isn’t likely slowing the rookie down. He’s the front runner for Defensive Rookie of the Year (with all due respect to Brian Burns), and he might wind up as a Defensive Player of the Year candidate by the time this season is over.
PW: Is Richard Sherman still Richard Sherman, or do you think he’s fallen off some?
NW: Who doesn’t fall off at least a little bit in their mid-30s, ya know?
All joking aside, Sherman isn’t quite the All-Pro version of himself that we saw with the Legion of Boom in Seattle in the early part of this decade. That said, he’s still a very good player. His football IQ is off the charts, and it shows in the way he’s able to outthink receivers to get ahead of them despite some declining athleticism.
Every once in a while, a fast receiver will just run past him, but that doesn’t happen often because of his understanding of angles and leverage. He’s not a top-three corner anymore, but he’s absolutely a quality NFL starter.
PW: The 49ers are 6-0 coming into this one. Is that record legit, and are they contenders? What’s their ceiling like for this year?
NW: It’s definitely legitimate. They have the second-best point differential in the NFL by a pretty significant margin. Their strength of schedule is bad, but they’ve pretty much rolled over every team they’ve played. For now, they have to be in the title contender conversation. Their ceiling is a Super Bowl berth. That would require a lot of things going right, though. Not to mention Aaron Rodgers and the Packers are starting to figure it out. Drew Brees is about to be back in New Orleans. The Cowboys are getting healthier. The Vikings are starting to roll. The NFC is deep and wide-open.
The thing separating those teams from the 49ers is consistent offensive production. If San Francisco can start hanging around the 30-point mark pretty regularly and win a couple games against contenders late in the regular season, they’ll cement themselves in the Super Bowl conversation. Until they do, though, their inclusion with the top-tier teams will come with the caveat about their offense not holding up with the rest of the NFC contenders.
