Berserkley once more: Stanford wins on a blocked PAT

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By Art Spander

BERKELEY, Calif. — It was Berserkley all over again, this time with cardboard cutouts in attendance.

You can put masks on the coaches, but you can’t cover up the unpredictability of a game when Stanford is at Cal.

So much has been made about The Play, the laterals, legal and illegal, that gave Cal the win in 1982 and gave TV a lifetime of reruns.

Then, almost forgotten, in 1988 a kid from Vietnam, Tuan Van Le, blocked a short field goal with three seconds left to keep Stanford in a 19-19 tie.

In this Covid-19 season, on a Friday at Memorial Stadium, without fans but certainly not without drama, Thomas Booker of Stanford blocked a Cal extra point attempt with less than a minute left to preserve a 24-23 victory.

That was after Cal had a field goal partially blocked late in the first half.

When the PAT was blocked, on the sideline Cal coach Justin Wilcox showed his shock by grabbing at his mask and momentarily pulling if off his face.

Cal also lost two fumbles, one on a muffed punt deep its own territory that set up Stanford’s first touchdown.

Asked what he would do to correct the failings, Wilcox said, “It’s unacceptable. On special teams, it’s literally a simple technique that we have to execute with great effort, and we are having issues.”

That’s putting it mildly.

“I’ve got to help give them answers,” said Wilcox. “We’ve got to coach better. And we’ve got to perform better on special teams.”

So someone perceptively asked why, after that last touchdown, didn’t Cal — which had been moving the ball well — go for the two-point conversion?

“I felt we had shored up (the defense) where we needed to be shored up,” said the coach, “and I felt good about going into overtime. That’s on me.”

Booker, a 6-foot-4, 310-pound junior, said the defense had been getting in against Cal on place kicks.

“We had put pressure on them earlier,” Booker said, “so I knew we had a chance.” 

What both teams wanted this bizarre season, with games being cancelled, was a chance to get off the schneid, in gambling lingo, to grab a win. And although outplayed the first half, Stanford got that win.

And thus in what was the 123rd Big Game, the Cardinal regained the old trophy, the Stanford Axe.

Cal took it in 2019, after nine straight Stanford wins, and the school’s rally committee was not going to allow anyone to forget.

On a huge section of empty seats, the big, colored ones used for card stunts were aligned so they read “OUR,” with a depiction of the axe.

We’re familiar, unfortunately, with the restrictions and adaptations brought about by the pandemic, golf tournaments held without galleries, ball games with nobody in the bleachers, but perhaps nowhere is the void more noticeable than in college football.

It was a spectacularly beautiful late-autumn afternoon for the game, and in any other year on a day like that there would have been tailgate parties packed with people wearing red or blue, laughing, shouting and relishing the camaraderie of sport.

But it was not to be, understandably. The streets were empty. The only sounds were from those piped in growls and groans that have nothing to do with cheers or chants.

The national anthem and Cal fight song were played. That should be enough, right?

Maybe next year we return to normal, as far as celebrating our sports. Of course, the way this one ended seems normal for a Cal-Stanford game.

Some draft day: Warriors get Wiseman, lose Klay

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By Art Spander

Now the wait begins for the Warriors. To see how quickly Klay Thompson recovers from yet another injury.

To see if James Wiseman becomes the dominant player he’s supposed to be.

To see when and if, in this Covid-cursed time, they’ll be allowed to have crowds for home games at Chase Center.

A Wednesday that was supposed to be advantageous, Golden State able to utilize the second pick in the ’20 NBA draft — with which Wiseman was selected — became tumultuous.

Thompson, preparing for a comeback after the terrible injury that ripped his left knee and the Warriors' chances in the 2019 playoff finals, hurt his lower right leg during a workout in southern California, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.

Meanwhile, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the San Francisco Department of Health rejected the team’s plans to allow 18,000-seat Chase to be half-filled for games, setting a maximum of 4,500 because of Covid restrictions.

All this news and not a single jump shot since March. But certainly plenty of speculation, not unusual for any draft day, much less one as full of disabiltity — Klay’s injury — and possibility as this one.

ESPN had been touting the draft as the Warriors’ opportunity to rebuild a dynasty, Golden State having reached the finals five straight times, 2015-2019, and having won three of those.

If that record doesn’t quite fulfill the requirement of a dynasty, particularly compared to the Celtics of the 1960s and Lakers of the 1980s and 2000s, it was the best in basketball for a while, a long while.

You add a high pick, which turned out to be the 7-foot-1 Wiseman, put Steph Curry, Draymond Green and Thompson on the court with him and, well, maybe they wouldn’t win it all, but they’d at least remind us of what used to be.

Then we were reminded, but the wrong way, with Thompson’s injury, the severity of which remains in question until additional tests are made.

But as they say, when one of your stars returns after missing a season because of a torn anterior cruciate ligament and then injures his other leg and hobbles off the court, it’s not going to be good news.

The early report is Klay has “a significant Achilles injury.” If so, the dynasty rebuilld will be stopped before it has started. Kevin Durant is proof that Achilles injuries take months to overcome.

The basketball fates smiled on the Warriors. Now they sneer. Curry broke his left hand several games into last season, and by the time he returned the team was headed for the draft lottery.

They did have a bit of good fortune, earning the No. 2 overall pick, but this second injury to Klay, who’s now 30, ruins everything.

As an undergrad at Memphis last year, his only year, Wiseman was burdened with his own problems.

In his first game as a freshman, he had 28 points and 11 rebounds. But two more games, and whop, Wiseman was suspended by the NCAA for accepting improper benefits, including $11,500 in moving expenses from Memphis coach Penny Hardaway.

Instead of trying to regain his eligibility, Wiseman, who was a one-and-done guy anyway, in effect said "the heck with it" and waited to enter the NBA draft. If he doesn’t have the last laugh, he’ll have plenty of money. And the Warriors will have a potential all-star at center.

“Going through adversity made me stronger,” Wiseman said after he was taken, following the selection of Georgia’s Anthony Edwards — the guard some observers say the Warriors coveted — and before LaMelo Ball, the guard who played around the world.

With Wiseman, the Warriors have the inside game they will need without Thompson joining Curry for the outside game.

Without Klay, the Warriors have a huge question.

Not the trade-off that anyone could wish.

For Dustin Johnson, a Masters of success and tears

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By Art Spander

It seemed more coronation than competition. Sure, there were a few moments of doubt early on, but when it was finished there was Dustin Johnson, fighting back tears and wearing a green jacket.

Johnson had both realized a dream and broken records, taking the Masters by a figurative mile and fulfilling the promise of greatness that had been forecast but, for so long, remained more curse than blessing.

When he putted out Sunday at the final hole of the first November Masters, Johnson had a 4-under 68, an unimaginable total of 20-under-par 268 — two shots lower than the winning marks shared by Tiger Woods and Jordan Spieth — and a five-shot victory, the largest margin since Tiger’s triumph in 1997.

And when CBS’ Amanda Balionis, on a green near the Augusta National clubhouse — alone because of pandemic restrictions — asked Johnson what the win meant, he reached up to wipe his eyes and then paused several times to gather himself.

“On the golf course, I’m pretty good at it,” he said about controlling emotions. “Out here, I’m not. As a kid I dreamed about winning the Masters.”

He is the son of a golf pro and grew up in South Carolina, a couple hours away from Augusta.

“It’s been the tournament I wanted to win most,” he said.

Now he’s won it, a second major along with the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont — a poignant answer to those who belittled his golfing intelligence, who emphasized his failing instead of his success. And since he’s No. 1 in the world rankings, he’s had a considerable amount of success.

He has 27 wins and was PGA Tour Player of the Year in 2016 and 2020. At 36, Johnson is both young and experienced. He survived disappointment and criticism — blowing that lead in the last round of the 2002 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach made him wiser stronger.

“He’s been knocking at the door so long,” said Rory McIlroy of Johnson. “I think this validates what he did at Oakmont.”

McIlroy also has been knocking on the Masters door. It’s the only one of the four Grand Slam tournaments Rory hasn’t won. He was nine shots behind Johnson this time.

Asked about Johnson’s devil-may-care image, McIlroy said, “He’s smarter than you think. He’s switched on more than everyone in the media thinks. I’ll just put it that way.”

The fourth day of this unique Masters, one without paying spectators — patrons, they’re called by the club — one in autumn rather than April, began with in morning in order to finish before afternoon NFL games.

Johnson was four shots ahead at tee-off, but that margin was trimmed to one after he bogied four and five.  It quickly was restored. Johnson birdied six and went on his way.

Cameron Smith of Australia, who shot 69 and became the first player in the tournament’s 84 years with all four rounds in the 60s, and Sungjae Im of Korea tied for second at 273, 15-under.

“I was actually saying before, you know, I'd take 15‑under around here the rest of my career and I might win a couple,” said Smith. “So yeah, that’s just the way it is.”

Because Johnson was just the way he was — and the course, after that heavy rain Thursday morning just when play began, was just the way it was. Brooks Koepka, winner twice of the U.S. Open and twice of the PGA, said the turf was to Johnson’s liking.

“The course suited him down to the ground,” said Koepka, who tied for seventh. “He’s more of a picker of the ball. He doesn’t spin it that much with his irons. The ball’s not going to be backing up.

“He’s been on a tear since the Travelers (in June, after the Tour restarted). It almost feels like it’s coming, and it was this week.”

Said Johnson, alluding to the virus pandemic and tournaments without fans and thus without cheers, “It has been a really strange year, but it’s been really good to me.”

You might say it was a masterful year.

Dustin should win — but in golf, nothing is certain

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By Art Spander

He is four shots ahead with only a single round remaining, the world No. 1 playing like the world No. 1, loaded with confidence on a course that suits his game, breaking par and practically breaking records.

There’s only one reason that Dustin Johnson wouldn’t win this Masters. It’s called golf, and in golf nothing is certain.

Golf is a game in which you don’t have control over your opponents, and sometimes not over yourself.

A game where a one-foot putt and a 300-yard drive each count the same number of strokes. A game where you can lose a lead before you tee off.

A game where there’s no relief pitcher or backup quarterback when things go bad.

Dustin knows all about the agony of golf. He tossed away a three-shot advantage in the final round of the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, shooting 82.

He three-putted the 72 hole of the 2015 Open at Chambers Bay.

He also knows all about the ecstasy. He won the 2016 Open at Oakmont and this year everything else on the pandemic-shortened Tour schedule.

Johnson, yes, ought to take this tournament. On Saturday, he became the first in 84 years to shoot a second round of 65 in the same Masters, and his 65-70-65—200, 16 under par, ties the all-time low for 54 holes at the tournament set by Jordan Spieth.

Still, golf can be chilling. In 2011, Rory McIlroy also had a four-shot margin at the Masters and shot 80 the final day.

And only three months ago, Johnson held the lead in the PGA Championship at Harding Park in San Francisco, albeit by one stroke, and came in tied for second, a shot behind Collin Morikawa.

Yet everything seems perfect for Johnson, including the fairways and greens, soft from the big rain on Thursday morning.

“If I can play like I did today,” said Johnson, referring to his missed chances of the past, “I think it would break the streak. (Sunday) is just 18 holes of golf. I need to go out and play solid. I feel like I’m swinging well. If I can just continue to give myself looks at birdies, I think I’ll have a good day.”

He’s on a roll, which seems the proper word at Augusta National, where the hills and swales have an effect, where big hitters such as Johnson always have had an edge. On Saturday he reached the downhill 575-yard 2nd hole with a 5-iron and made the putt for an eagle 3.

His only mistake of the round was at 18, and, of course, he saved par. On the Golf Channel, Brandel Chamblee compared it to a pitcher losing a perfect game with two outs in the ninth, but it was not that fateful.

So much has been written about the power and length of Bryson DeChambeau. Dustin Johnson is a less bulked-up DeChambeau, muscular and effective. DeChambeau, by the way, came out on Saturday, played nine and made the cut after being forced to stop on Friday because of darkness.

Self-belief is a necessity in golf. When you know you’ll hit the way you want, you do just that.

“Coming off a good finish” at Houston, the previous week, Johnson said on Tuesday, “Got a lot of confidence in the game ... As long as the game stays in good form, I think I’m hopefully going to be around here Sunday and have a chance to win.”

He’s got a chance, an excellent chance.

On Saturday, after three rounds and that big lead, Johnson was no less enthusiastic.

“I would say the game is in really good form,” said Johnson. “It’s just very consistent. I feel like I’ve got a lot of control over what I’m doing, controlling my distance well with my flight and my shape. I’m very comfortable standing over the golf ball, and obviously that’s a really good feeling.”

He just needs to hold on to that feeling. In golf, it can disappear as rapidly as a ball into a water hazard, and there are plenty of those the back nine at the Masters.

Cantlay is back as a contender at the Masters

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By Art Spander

The same guys seem to play well there every year. Patrick Cantlay said it about the Masters. He meant people like Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson.

He could have included someone else: himself.

Cantlay briefly was in the final-round lead a year ago after an eagle at the 15th. A couple of bogies and that celebrated win by Tiger all but chased him out of our memories.

Now, two rounds into this ’20 Masters, Cantlay’s back, and very much so.

The leaders, four people including Johnson, Justin Thomas — two of the same guys — Abraham Ancer and Cameron Smith (who are new guys), were tied for the temporary 36-hole lead at 9-under-par 135. Temporary because the second round wasn’t concluded.

Cantlay, whose 66 shared Friday’s low round, was a shot behind for 36 holes, at 136. He needed nine holes Friday morning to complete the first round that was unfinished Thursday, and then he played another 18. Phew.

“Today was a long day,” he said, as if one that began on the course at 7:30 a.m. and ended in late afternoon could be anything else.

It also was a successful day, if a bit nerve-wracking. The first time around, his second shot to the 15th landed on the crest of a slope and trickled into the water.

“I got up and down for a par 5,” said a relieved Cantlay, “which was pretty big at the time.”

In the afternoon he birdied the hole, just missing an eagle attempt.

Cantlay is 28. His background is the stuff of movie plots, perhaps appropriate for a native southern Californian. While at UCLA in 2011, he was the world’s No. 1 amateur. He went pro and first incurred a stress fracture in his back, then became despondent after his caddy, a long-time friend, was struck fatally by a hit-and-run driver in Newport Beach near where Cantlay stood.

“For a while, I could care less about everything,” Cantlay told the Santa Ana Register. “Not just golf, everything ... Nothing felt like it mattered.”

Certainly golf matters now. He won the Zozo tournament, his third Tour victory, at Sherwood outside Los Angeles, his home area, three weeks ago. And while he said that is a confidence boost, he tries not to get too emotional. Even about his chances at the Masters.

“I do everything in a stoic way,” said Cantlay. ”I don’t work on it too much. If anything, I work on trying to smile a little more. I’m just kind of naturally that way. I’m that way when I eat breakfast. I’m that way when I play cards. That’s who I am.” 

That works for both cards and golf, of course. Don’t show how you feel, until the end. Don’t get rattled or excited.

Ben Hogan would have approved. The great Hogan rarely changed expression on the course. Golf was serious labor to Ben, as it is to Cantlay.

“I enjoy it out there,” said Cantlay. “Golf is what I love to do. But I’m just as focused as I can on doing the best I can.”

He should be pleased, then, to know that in the last four rounds played in the Masters, of the players on the leaderboard, he’s been the best, at 20 under par.

“I think part of that,” he said about the achievement, “is you just get good feelings here, and you come back every year. I’m just trying to build those good feelings.”

Construction is nearly complete.

“I think for the most part my game plan hasn’t changed much,” said Cantlay, “but just feeling comfortable and getting some momentum around here ... Some good stuff was coming, and it did at the Zozo.

“Hopefully there’s still more to come.”

Woods’ opening Masters round was ‘Tiger-esque’

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By Art Spander

Tiger-esque. Justin Leonard used the word, a neologism, about a round of golf Thursday by, yes, Tiger Woods — who else?

He used it on the Golf Channel. Used it to describe the way that Woods shot a 4-under-par 68 in the opening round of the Masters. Used it to emphasize that, in this era of power, this age of Bryson DeChambeau and 400-yard tee shots, there’s still a place for accuracy and consistency.

There's still room for someone like Leonard himself, the 1997 British Open champion, who when he wasn’t splitting fairways was saving pars out of bunkers.

Day One of the 84th Masters, and there was Woods — near the end of a golfing year full of disappointment and questions — high on a leader board of nostalgia.  

Tiger was three shots behind Paul Casey — a lead that, because the round would not be completed until Friday after a 2-hour, 47-minute rain delay, was not definite. But Woods was there, definitely. And unexpectedly, perhaps.

The Masters is the old guys’ major, where experience counts. Those greens are killers, loaded with subtle breaks and drops, even when the tournament is shifted to the fall for the first time from its traditional spring dates because of the pandemic.

Jack Nicklaus won it at age 46 in 1986. Familiarity brings contentment when you no longer can bring the long ball. Check Thursday’s scores: Bernhard Langer, 70 (he’s age 63); Larry Mize, also a 70 (he’s age 62).

Tiger isn’t quite in that age group, but he will be 45 in December, and he hadn’t done much since the Tour restarted in the summer after the Covid suspension.

But he is Tiger. We’ve seen it in Nicklaus, in Gary Player, in athletes from other sports. Greatness may diminish, but it doesn’t disappear. As Woods reminded us.

He stunned us in the last Masters, winning when supposedly he had no chance. He couldn’t do it again, could he?

“In the beginning of his career, (Woods) was Nolan Ryan,” said Leonard, invoking a fellow Texan for comparison. “He could do things nobody else could do with a golf ball. Now he’s more of a Greg Maddux. He’s got to mix his pitches. He’s got to paint the corners of the plate. He’s got to fool the hitters.”

A baseball analogy. In golf, the only people Tiger has to fool are those who figure his career has reached the end.

“I saw Tiger (on Thursday) hit a lot of little knockdown shots,” said Leonard, about lower-trajectory or punch shots. “He has to do things differently. (Fellow analyst) Brandel Chamblee spoke of softer conditions bringing the medium-length hitters back into the fold. It certainly was soft, and Woods certainly is a medium-length hitter.”

Still, your score is based on how many strokes you take, not how long or short you hit the ball.

On Thursday, Woods took almost a minimum. He had nothing higher on any hole than a par, his first bogey-free round of his last 106 rounds in the majors and his first at the Masters since 2008. He hit 10 of 14 fairways and 15 greens.

“Yeah, I did everything well,” said Woods. “I drove it well, hit my irons well, putted well. The only bad shot I hit today was, I think, eight. (That’s the uphill par-5). I had a perfect number (yards) with a 60-degree sand wedge, and I hit it on the wrong shelf.”

Woods said he is upbeat any time he’s at Augusta National Golf Club, the Masters' home, and why not? He’s won the tournament five times, one fewer than Nicklaus and one more than Arnold Palmer.

“Understanding how to play this golf course is so important,” said Woods. “I’ve been saying that I’ve been lucky enough to have so many practice rounds throughout my career with so many past champions. And I was able to win the event early in my career and build myself up for understanding you’re going to come (here) every year.

“I saw Raymond (Floyd), Bernhard (Langer) and Freddie (Couples) always contend late in their careers (each was a Masters champion). Just understanding how to play this golf course was a big part of it.”

Tiger Woods, who has been a big part of the Masters, obviously understands.

Pretension and competition — that’s the Masters

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By Art Spander

The Masters always has been a tournament of equal parts pretension and competition.

The insistence to call spectators “patrons” can be discomforting.

The intent to put on an event CBS’s Jim Nantz calls “a tradition unlike any other” — is that pretentious enough for you? — can be satisfying.

A month from his 45th birthday, Tiger Woods will appear in this Masters, which starts on Thursday. As both defending champion and symbol.

He has become not only the face of the event but, because of his ethnic background and singular recognition, the voice as well, interesting especially for those who remember the bad old days of racism in the game and at the club.

A sport once as white as the balls used for play, golf crept slowly into the present. The Masters began in 1934. No African-American appeared until 1975, when Lee Elder was in the field.

The current Masters chairman, Fred Ridley, a former U.S. Amateur champion, announced Monday that Elder, now 86, next April would join Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player to hit a ceremonial first tee shot.

Woods tweeted his delight, and on Tuesday, interview day for so many of the big guns, Tiger said in affirmation, “Lee was a pioneer. He was the one that broke the color barrier here and paved the way for players of color like myself to be able to play in this event.”

Woods also was aware of a chronological connection.

“It’s ironic he did it in ’75.” Woods said of Elder. “I was born in ’75, and when I won in ’97 (Elder) was on the back of the green. So to have him here Monday, and to be able to see him and have him as our honorary starter next April — it’s awfully special and important in the history of the event. But for me personally, it’s probably even more important.”

When it comes to importance, no one at the moment compares to Tiger. As ESPN is all too well aware.

The network may not care that much for golf — the NFL is the hot item, of course — but it cares for personalities and ratings. Since ESPN has the Thursday and Friday rounds (CBS has Saturday and Sunday), it has overwhelmed us with Tiger.

Look, Woods’ come-from-behind victory 19 months ago was stunning, but it wasn’t a world changing, “where were you when?” sort of occurrence like the moon landing. Big in sports? Absolutely. But let’s not get carried away.

Tiger’s first Masters was in 1995, when he was 19 and a freshman at Stanford. A quarter century later, he recalls a Wednesday practice round with a couple of tournament champions named Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer.

“I was a little punk college student,” a chuckling Woods said, “and we’re playing for skins (dollars) and I didn’t have any cash in my pocket.”

Through the years, even after he earned millions, Woods was notorious for not paying off golf debts.

“Arnold makes a putt on 18,” said Tiger. “Takes all the skins away from us. And Jack and Arnold asked me, ‘Hey, do you want to go play the par-3 contest?’ Well, I’m scheduled to go later. ‘Well, just follow us.’ And we played together, and that was awesome.”

The word is overused in sports, but it very much applies to Woods. He won the ’97 Masters, and as the TV folks tell us, he “made the dial move.” Anytime he’s out there, it still moves.

Woods has won five Masters and 82 pro tournaments. He’s won the love of golf fans — well, patrons — and manufacturers of golf products, not a small percentage of which have shirts and hats with his logo on the front.

A fixture in April, the Masters in 2020 has been shifted to late autumn because of the coronavirus pandemic.

”We’ve never played it in the fall,” said Woods. “The grass is different. The conditions are different. The run-up to the event is different.”

But it still is the Masters, pretension and competition. Wonderful.

Niners learn difference between starters and subs

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By Art Spander

What could Kyle Shanahan say? What could anyone say, except that what happened to the 49ers on Thursday night was, given the circumstances, inevitable.

Although as a head coach, Shanahan never would make that sort of a concession.

He called the game a challenge, which is a sanitized way of pointing out that his team — many of whom were injured, three of whom were on the reserve/Covid-19 list — was loaded with substitutes. And overmatched.

Especially against the Green Bay Packers.

The Pack beat the Niners, 34-17, at Levi’s Stadium. Unlike the election, it was decided quickly.

Maybe the game shouldn’t have been played after the Niners facility in Santa Clara was closed Wednesday morning, when it was disclosed that receiver Kendrick Bourne had tested positive.

After all, Cal‘s Saturday night game against Washington was cancelled because a Golden Bears player tested positive. But supposedly the city of Berkeley made the call, not the school. 

And there are two differences. Call off a pro Thursday nighter, and the NFL network is losing money, which we have come to understand is what drives sports. Also, NFL coaches seem obsessed by Tennyson’s Light Brigade, a sense of do or die, figuratively riding onward.

Asked about pushing the Niners-Packers game back a few days, Shanahan said, “I don’t think about that stuff. It was never brought up. I don’t think about it. We were going to play Thursday at 5.”

And so with a backup quarterback, a backup tight end, and numerous other backups, the Niners did play. It was estimated that San Francisco had $80 million of cap space on injured reserve, including of course QB Jimmy Garoppolo, tight end George Kittle, running back Raheem Mostert and defensive end Nick Bosa.

To steal a line from another sport, there’s no crying in football. There’s just playing. And in the Niners’ case, waiting. They face New Orleans a week from Sunday, and for a third straight game a Super Bowl-winning QB — Drew Brees. On Thursday, it was the Pack’s Aaron Rodgers; four days previously, Seattle’s Russell Wilson.

The Niners used Nick Mullens at the position Thursday night. He wasn’t very good, throwing an interception and losing a fumble. But most of the 49ers weren’t very good. As is Mullens, they’re subs.

The Niners were in a hole quickly enough, 21-3, in the second quarter, and Mullens was under a heavy rush. On the other side, Rodgers, the Cal grad who should have been taken by the Niners in the first round of the 2005 draft, was passing for 305 yards and four touchdowns.

Some media considered this the Packers’ chance for retribution, since the Niners last season stomped Green Bay twice, including in the NFC Championship game. But as Shanahan reminded, different years, different personnel. (And it might it be pointed out, a different result.)

“I’m looking forward for the next three days off for our players,” said Shanahan. “Something that’s needed pretty bad.”

After consecutive defeats, the Niners are 4-5. The playoffs seem unlikely, except to the coach.

“We’ve got one game in the next 24 days. After New Orleans, we can enjoy our bye week. Then we can get back on track and try to turn this thing around, come back and play some better football.”

Not if they don’t get some better players.

There’s a reason some people are starters. That next-man-up mantra sounds great, but invariably the next man up isn’t as good as the man he replaced — otherwise he would be the starter, not the replacement.

Nobody’s really to blame for the Niners situation. “Sometimes you bite the bear,” former Niners owner Eddie DeBartolo used to say, “and sometimes the bear bites you.”

There have been too many bear bites this season for the 49ers. Also, too many defeats.

Mediocre may be proper description for Niners

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By Art Spander

Nick Mullens was better. The 49ers were not. You take the triumphs where you can. Especially in a season full of defeats. One of those — another of those — coming on Sunday.

That the Niners couldn’t beat the Seahawks, especially at Seattle, especially turning the ball over twice — two interceptions by the star-crossed guy Mullens replaced, Jimmy Garoppolo — was not exactly headline stuff.

The Seahawks have one of the best quarterbacks in the game — yes, Patrick Mahomes is included — and a great quarterback makes a difference. Some would add, “Along with a strong defense,” although until Sunday, when they beat the 49ers, 37-27, the Seahawks had a mediocre defense, ranking 24th of the 32 teams.

Mediocre also may be the proper listing for the Niners. They are 4-4 halfway through a season that, because of injuries and errors both in judgment and commission, appears destined to end up in a manner that fans fear.

We’ll find out more in four days. On Thursday night at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, San Francisco gets another considerable test, the Green Bay Packers.

The Pack lost Sunday to Minnesota, another franchise in America’s cold country. But in Aaron Rodgers, he of the State Farm commercials, and no less a Cal alumnus, Green Bay has what the 49ers lack, stability at QB.

No, you can’t do much about injuries, particularly in the salary cap era. Is anyone old enough to remember when the Niners of Eddie D, Bill Walsh and Carmen Policy signed everyone and anyone? These days, you just have to hope the next men up are talented.

San Francisco has used three different quarterbacks this short stretch, QB roulette, if you will, because Garoppolo incurred a high ankle sprain the second game of the season.

On came Mullens, who did so well some observers thought he should be the permanent starter — until two weeks later when Mullens was, well, ineffective is the the gentle way of phrasing it, and was replaced by C.J. Beathard.

Asked what happened that day against the Philadelphia Eagles, Mullens said, “I wish I knew.” Since then we do know, Garoppolo, gutting it out but restricted by his ailing ankle, returned until Sunday Mullens returned.

Mullens directed the 49ers to a mini-comeback in the second half. He completed 18 of 25 for 238 yards and led touchdown drives of 80, 79 and 61 yards.

Presumably he’ll be the starter Thursday, and presumably he’ll be better than the last start. He certainly knows the proper things to say.

“I think what I learned,” he said, “is how tough the NFL is. The thing that creates energy is making plays. And I feel on the both sides of the ball (Sunday) we obviously didn’t do that well enough.”

The Niners were missing wideout Deebo Samuel, who is as much a part of the running game — which is the Niners’ offense — as the passing game. San Francisco must play from ahead, get the ball and grinding away yards and time off the clock. When they fall behind, as they did on Sunday, well, they stay behind.

All this affects the tactics of Niners fourth-year coach Kyle Shanahan, whose philosophy is built on powerful backs and ball control.

Drawing x’s and o’s on paper can be fascinating, but as what has befallen the supposedly unconquerable Bill Belichick this month — the Patriots lost their fourth in a row on Sunday — you must have the players.

Misery may love company, but football takes no relief if others are stumbling along with themselves.

“I was frustrated with the whole offense,” Shanahan said about the way his team played, “starting with myself. We were trying to hit some big plays. We didn’t get much from the run game (52 yards).

“We tried to get it going. Eventually, we had to get away from it and start throwing.”

Giving Nick Mullens another chance.

Niners looking for their identity — and some touchdowns

in ,

By Art Spander
For Maven Sports

This is the season that every team in pro football has, other than the Patriots for that long period. The season that coaches fear and fans dread. The season when you stop asking what’s wrong and instead ask what’s right — if anything.

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Copyright 2020, The Maven

Phil implied there would be trouble — and there was

in ,

By Art Spander
For Maven Sports

Golf is different. In team sports, when those in charge no longer believe you are ineffective, that you’re too old, they put you on waivers or drop you — as the San Francisco Giants did recently with longtime favorites Hunter Pence and Pablo Sandoval.

Read the full story here.

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