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00:00Yeah, the rare season-long addition of Grandy's Grades here on 95.7,
00:04the game in Willard and Dibs.
00:05The Niners went 12-5, as we know,
00:07and lost in the divisional round to the eventual NFC champion Seattle Seahawks.
00:12We'll go by position group, as always, and we will grade the entire season.
00:16We begin with the quarterback position, which was manned by Brock Purdy
00:20and Mac Jones, almost an even split over the course of the entire season.
00:25It was a lot more positive than negative, absolutely.
00:29This group kept the Niners afloat for multiple weeks
00:32while all of their position groups, other than Christian McCaffrey, were injured.
00:37I gave them a B+.
00:38This was a really, really good year for Niners quarterbacks.
00:41There were some bad weeks, particularly I'm thinking of Brock Purdy
00:46versus the Panthers on that national TV game late in the season,
00:49but it was definitely more good than bad B-plus for the quarterback position.
00:53I think B-plus feels right.
00:55They definitely don't get an A.
00:56I can't give them an A because of a few things that you talked about like that.
01:01The Carolina game, dealing with injury, it just wasn't A-level stuff.
01:07But I don't know how you can't be way, way more positive than negative with the way they played.
01:13Both of them went in there and won the majority of their games.
01:16Mac Jones certainly overperformed what any expectation would have been.
01:20And Brock Purdy, once he got going, schedule, sure, but 7-2 with a very, very high rating
01:27and obviously very good output, some 40-point games, etc.
01:32B-plus feels right to me, too.
01:34It's an A-minus for me, and it's because of Mac Jones.
01:37It's the fact that your backup came in and went 5-3.
01:41Your backup went down to L.A. on a short week and beat the Rams.
01:45And it turns out the Rams were a very, very good team.
01:48Mac Jones played through pain.
01:49He did that.
01:50They both had their mistakes.
01:51The Carolina game is a great example of some sloppiness.
01:54But the fact that your backup did that, and if you look at their numbers,
01:58almost identical between Brock and Mac in terms of quarterback rating, not QBR,
02:03but the rating and the touchdowns and the yardage.
02:06So Mac was all that, which is why I move him up to an A-minus.
02:10All right, I like that.
02:12Up next is skill positions, running backs, tight ends, and wide receivers.
02:16Much like the quarterback position, this was more positive than negative.
02:19It was really, really highly influenced by one singular guy in Christian McCaffrey.
02:24He was your leading rusher and your leading receiver,
02:26and it wasn't close on either front.
02:28I mean, the dude had 924 receiving yards and seven receiving touchdowns.
02:34Juwan Jennings was really good this year.
02:35So was George Kittle.
02:36It was really just those three, though, that had any kind of consistent impact.
02:40From the skill position group, the rest of the group was marred by injury
02:45or just lack of ability to perform.
02:48So those three carry the majority of the weight.
02:51It was a B-plus, though, because those three were just so good,
02:53particularly McCaffrey for the whole season.
02:55For me, it's a B-minus.
02:57McCaffrey gets an A-plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, plus if there was such a thing.
03:01And, you know, Kittle was good when healthy, but not always healthy.
03:04And Juwan was good.
03:05He played through pain.
03:06But other than that, the group was really kind of underwhelming.
03:10I ran down the stat earlier about how rarely they threw to wide receivers,
03:14and that's a part of it.
03:15So I was a little bit disappointed with the group.
03:18McCaffrey, amazing.
03:19B-minus.
03:20I'm going to knock it down even further because there's a player you guys are leaving out,
03:23and he technically is a part of this, and his name is Brandon Ayuk.
03:26So Christian McCaffrey, obviously, I'm with you.
03:29I don't give him A-plus, plus, plus, plus, because he gave that game away against Seattle.
03:33But, anyway, he was an A.
03:37He was fantastic, obviously.
03:39And then, Juwan, good.
03:41And then other players where you're like, well, they were good when they were there.
03:44George Kittle was good when he was there.
03:46Kendrick Bourne.
03:46Kendrick Bourne.
03:47Ricky Pearsall had some moments where he was good when he was there.
03:50But there just wasn't anything other than Christian that was consistent.
03:55The only other consistent thing was how badly Brandon Ayuk left his team in alert.
04:01So, for me, I fall it down to a C-plus.
04:03Fair enough.
04:04Up next is the offensive line.
04:06I had a strange relationship with the offensive line all year.
04:09They were bad, and when I say bad, really bad for a handful of weeks.
04:13But there was a decent stretch there once they got on that winning streak towards the end of the season
04:17where they were a whole lot better than I was expecting.
04:20Largely, I was disappointed in their inability to run the ball basically the entire season.
04:25It's amazing that McCaffrey still got 1,200 rushing yards this season
04:28considering what it felt like on a game-to-game basis.
04:31There also were some injuries that they had to fight through.
04:34I think eventually an injury led to one of the better moves,
04:37which was Spencer Burford at left guard,
04:39and that turned out to be probably the best option for them at that spot.
04:43It wasn't terrible, but I never came into a game thinking that was a strength.
04:47It's a C-minus.
04:48It wasn't terrible, but it was honestly better than I was expecting.
04:52Yeah, I'm going to give it a C also.
04:53A little bit higher, but I largely agree with what you're saying where it's like there was this good stretch.
04:59It was kind of right when Brock got back, and then they had some really good games in there.
05:04But for me, there's two things that are the bottom line.
05:07One, in two consecutive games at the end of the year, you got absolutely manhandled by the Seattle Seahawks.
05:13And two, other than a couple of games, Atlanta, Chicago, et cetera, you could not run the football.
05:21And on a Shanahan team in that system, you have to be able to run the ball.
05:27So the offensive line, I can't do anything better than a C.
05:31Pretty harsh from the two of you.
05:32I've got it a little bit higher.
05:33And if you look at where they wound up, they were 10th in points scored,
05:37which tells me that you at least were able to do some things.
05:40And when Brock got back after his injury, they were hanging 30 and 40.
05:45I mean, they were starting to really cook.
05:46Yes, the Seattle mismatch and the Houston game, certainly those are matchups that they did not shine.
05:52But ultimately, they only gave up 27 sacks.
05:55And we talk about how they only had 20 sacks as a defense.
05:59They only gave up 27.
06:00I think you guys are being a little harsh.
06:02I have it as a B minus.
06:03All right.
06:04We transition now over to the defensive side of the football.
06:06We begin with the front seven, the defensive linemen and the linebackers.
06:10This one, for me, probably the most difficult group to grade because it was the one that was most impacted by injuries.
06:15You lose Nick Bosa for basically the entire season and you lose Fred Warner for more than half the season.
06:21So that is factored into my grade here.
06:23It never really felt like the front seven, either the D line or the linebacking core was a strength of this defense.
06:30I don't know if he could say that about the secondary.
06:31Either we'll get to that coming up in a little bit.
06:34But because of those injuries, I felt like I had to give him a little bit of a break in terms of a grade.
06:39You got some good performances here and there from some relative no names.
06:43I thought Tatum Bethune came in and played really well.
06:46You kind of got, you know, some decent performances from Keon White, who you acquired in a trade from the Patriots.
06:53Cleland Furl came back in and was one of your better pass rushers.
06:56Not saying all that much.
06:58Considering what the injuries were, I know it was not pretty.
07:01But honestly, I was expecting it to be worse.
07:04And those injuries factor heavily in.
07:06I gave the front seven a C- as well.
07:08Yeah, I'm with you.
07:09C- is the grade I was thinking about.
07:11And yeah, when you talk about a bend but don't break defense, they were the bend.
07:16And then the back end was the don't break.
07:18They bent a lot.
07:19They gave up a lot of yards on the ground.
07:21They didn't pressure the quarterback.
07:22The linebackers eventually got to the fourth stringers and they played great against Philly.
07:27But in general, that front seven was kind of in backward mode.
07:32So not impressed.
07:33Injury is a part of it.
07:34C-.
07:35Yeah, I had a hard time with this grade.
07:38I just, it's like, I don't know.
07:40Who am I grading?
07:41Was sort of the way I looked at it.
07:43That's a good question.
07:44Yeah, I ended up at C-plus.
07:47Same as you, like, I didn't find anything that was like, wow, that was great.
07:52You didn't rush the passer, et cetera.
07:53But every spot where you go and go, oh, that didn't go well, you have a yeah, but.
07:58Where you had a reason why.
08:00I do fall on the fact that some certain players got some good experience that I think will help them down the road.
08:06The interior line rookies for the Niners are part of that.
08:10Same for Dee Winters and Tatum Bethune.
08:12And so, you know, Dee Winters picked six like they had their moments this year.
08:18Nothing great.
08:19Fully understandable C-plus.
08:21Up next is the secondary.
08:23And I feel like I might get some hell from you guys for this.
08:27But I get the secondary a D-plus worse than the front seven, largely because this was a healthy group.
08:33And I know, of course, these two groups work hand in hand.
08:35If the front seven can't get pressure on the quarterback, it's going to make the secondary look a whole lot worse.
08:40But because the secondary was the most healthy of the three levels of the Niners defense all season long, and they still were consistently giving up third and longs, could not contain star receivers on the other side.
08:53I feel like they're deserving of a D-plus.
08:55I just have very little confidence in almost anybody on that secondary other than Diomedo or Lenore.
09:01You get too late in the season, and Upton Stout was a whole lot better.
09:04But whoever is playing safety, whether it was Pinnock early in the year or Mustafa once he came back or Jair Brown basically the entire season, I'm just waiting for disaster to strike.
09:15And it felt like more often than not, it did.
09:17I gave him a D-plus.
09:18Yeah, I don't think you're far off.
09:19That's kind of where my mind was.
09:21I went to a C-minus just because of two really, really positives, I think.
09:26I think that we didn't hear Diomedo or Lenore's name a lot this year, and there's a reason.
09:30It's because he's actually really good.
09:32And defense was just like, we're not going to go there.
09:34There's too many other spots to go.
09:36And I love who the Niners found in Upton Stout, who not only was a good player, but I thought showed up in some of the biggest moments of the entire year.
09:46Now, that said, Renardo Green, mild disappointment.
09:49The safety position was a revolving door, and outside of Jair Brown against Carolina, really did not have a great season.
09:57And I thought it was a position of need that the 49ers did not correctly address.
10:02It's a group that needs a lot of help this offseason.
10:05I don't think you're far off, but I went C-minus.
10:07I gave them the charity C because they were really up against it with no pass rush.
10:11And in general, going through my notes, they didn't give up a ton of explosives.
10:17There was misses.
10:18There was busted coverages and the like.
10:20But defensively, they wound up 13th in points allowed.
10:23So that's kind of middle of the pack.
10:25And they did it, as Mark mentioned.
10:27Lenore was good.
10:28Upton Stout, I thought, was terrific.
10:30And then the rest of the revolving door spots there were kind of hit and miss and more miss than hit.
10:36So I gave them one of those, like, charity gentleman C, and we'll see you next year.
10:42Yeah, I'm just tired of watching Jair Brown miss tackles.
10:45D-plus for me.
10:46Okay, up next is special teams.
10:48Remember how this special teams season began?
10:51I mean, it began and ended in Seattle, and it was bad in both of those games.
10:54But for most of the middle part of the season, other than Week 1 and the divisional round in Seattle, it was pretty damn good.
11:03Eddie Pinheiro came in and looked like the best kicker in the entire NFL.
11:07Sky Moore figured out when to catch a punt and when to call for a fair catch and when to actually return.
11:13You had a kickoff return by Sky Moore in that game against the Cardinals all the way down to the one-yard line.
11:19By a mile, this was a group that had a more positive impact than a negative impact.
11:24But because of how the season began and ended, I can't give them an A.
11:28I gave them a B-plus on special teams.
11:29Yeah, they came a long way.
11:30And it's funny how you mentioned the bookends.
11:32I'm looking at the first game, and I see a punt here.
11:35Sky Bobble in my notes.
11:37And, yeah, he eventually got to be pretty good.
11:40They were top 10 in punt return net and kick return net, 30th in punting net average.
11:47So it was a little bit hit and miss, but because of Eddie Pinheiro and what he did,
11:51like the Jake Moody thing we spent weeks talking about, you were saying, he's got to go.
11:56And I said, give him a chance.
11:58Well, they gave him a chance, and then he had to go.
12:01But all things considered, that unit came a long way.
12:04I gave him a B-minus.
12:05I actually went softer than both of you.
12:07I went A-minus on this group.
12:09I was really impressed.
12:10I don't think you go a whole season without some mistakes on special teams.
12:15You know, Rasheed Shahid, he got one on him.
12:18Like, that's going to happen.
12:20And, yes, did they stick with Jake Moody too long because it went into the actual season?
12:25Yeah, that's one game too long.
12:27So, yes, they did.
12:28And that's where the minus comes from.
12:30But week in and week out, their kicking game was phenomenal.
12:35They were professional.
12:36They were buttoned up.
12:37They were well-coached.
12:38Sky Moore did a good job.
12:40And I get them an A-minus because whatever they did, I don't know how, but they scared
12:45the Dickens out of the other kicker.
12:48Like, every week, they're just like, boo!
12:51And he would miss so many field goals this year, and it helped them out.
12:55So, I go A-minus.
12:56Yeah, shout out Bram Boyer, special teams coordinator.
12:58Last but not least, and I'll go quick here, it's coaching.
13:00They get the best grade of anybody.
13:03An A-minus from me.
13:04The way that Seattle handled the Niners in two of their last three games, I can't give it
13:08a straight A or an A-plus.
13:10You get dominated against Seattle, and then two weeks later, the same thing happens.
13:13That was disappointing, but this group is nowhere without this coaching staff.
13:17They get an A-minus.
13:17They carried this team all season long.
13:19Robert Sala goes one and done, and Kyle Shanahan may damn well win coach of the year,
13:23and if he doesn't, it's going to be real close.
13:25I understand the frustrations with the way the season ended against Seattle, but if we
13:30really look at this, they had no business being 12-5.
13:33They had no business winning in Philadelphia.
13:35This is an A for me.
13:36It's Saladay, and it's Sala, it's Boyer, and it's Shanahan, and you can go down to Bradley
13:41and Kasarek and all the rest of them.
13:44The coaching staff was awesome this year.
13:47Yeah, there's things that you can criticize.
13:49The use check pitch to McCaffrey on first down, you got to be bleeping me.
13:53That's one play.
13:54Like you said, Mark, they had no business being one of the last eight teams standing after
13:58all the injuries.
13:59They get an A.
14:01All right, and that's Grandy's grades.
14:02We'll see you again next year.
14:03We're going to give Grandy an A for Grandy's grades this year.
14:07Are you an A plus?
14:07A minus.
14:08Give him an A.
14:09Give him an A.
14:10Try it again next year.
14:11A plus or try again.
14:13Look at the timing.
14:14He even nailed it right at, I mean, just, I give you an A, dude.
14:18Give you an A.
14:18I'm going for an A plus next year.
14:19No, I don't know.
14:20I'm not giving an A.
14:21I want you to make a decision.
14:36Go to the beginning.
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