san-francisco Page 8 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

PSA for NFL teams picking a QB: Get a good coach first
For all of the teams vying for one of the top three quarterbacks in the 2023 NFL Draft — or pretty much any organization in search of a new option under center — the most important factor is the coach. That’s an obvious statement, and one I felt dumb writing, but count me among the many who thought ...

Brock Purdy’s debut made him into the new apex predator of rookie playoff QBs
Brock Purdy’s NFL playoff debut was a tour-de-force performance that shattered the paradigm for rookie NFL quarterbacks. In one game, the San Francisco 49ers’ virtuoso logged more playoff touchdowns than Jimmy Garoppolo has in his entire Niners career....

The 49ers' defense is dominating when it matters most — the 2nd half of games
The San Francisco 49ers are hot. Winners of 11 in a row and doing most of it with a rookie seventh-round pick at quarterback, this Niners squad is the most dangerous team in the postseason. Despite the outstanding play of Brock Purdy, San Francisco’s success has been possible due to their stifling d...

Bettors are hoping to ride the hot hand
The San Francisco 49ers have a long road ahead of them if they want to win their first Super Bowl since 1995. Not necessarily because they’re going to face a lot of strong competition — the NFC is rather weak this year — but because they have to win four straight games with 2022's Mr. Irrelevant und...

NFL Playoffs: The 2 NFC teams on upset alert are overshadowing the 1 that’s not
There’s been a ton of chatter this week about who’s on upset alert, and most of that talk has surrounded two NFC teams prone to losing in the most extravagant ways possible when it comes to the playoffs. The Dallas Cowboys and the Minnesota Vikings are 2.5- and 3-point favorites, respectively, in ma...

9 backup QBs have won a Super Bowl — could Brock Purdy be next?
Sixty-eight quarterbacks started at least one game in 2022. That’s a list that includes signal-callers like Mike “F’n” White, David Blough, Trace McSorley, Skylar Thompson, Desmond Ridder, Jarett Stidham... and “Mr. Irrelevant” Brock Purdy....

NFL Week 18 Takeaways: The Chiefs, Bills, Eagles, and 49ers looked good, but they're all still flawed
The NFL regular season is over. No need for RedZone, or multiple televisions set up in the den to properly enjoy football. There is a single matchup remaining on the college football calendar, and the NFL will play out one game at a time over the next five weeks — along with a flag football and a sk...

Every team in the NFL playoffs, ranked
Aaron Rodgers couldn’t beat the Detroit Lions. Who’d have thought I’d be uttering that statement at the beginning of the season? And with that loss, the NFL playoffs are set. Throughout the regular season, we laughed, cried, held our heads in shock, and Tom Brady endured his first losing season as a...

Could Brock Purdy catapult past Trey Lance as the future in San Francisco?
The San Francisco 49ers have been cooking in ways Russell Wilson hasn’t experienced in years. Since starting the season 3-4, the Niners have reeled off nine wins in a row and have already clinched another NFC West title. Much of that winning streak has come with Brock Purdy leading the way under cen...

One and done: NFL head coaches who only lasted a season or less at the helm
Not surprisingly, the Denver Broncos fired head coach Nathaniel Hackett after the team was embarrassed — AGAIN — in primetime. The Los Angeles Rams beat them 51-14, and Russell Wilson was once again dog shit. ...

Everybody Hurts sometimes
With three weeks left in the regular season, the Philadelphia Eagles have all but locked up the top seed in the NFC, needing just one win or a loss from both the Minnesota Vikings and San Francisco 49ers in order to secure home-field advantage through the NFC Championship and a first-round bye. With...

Naming Pat McAfee Sports Media Person of the Year is an indictment of us all
This is not (totally) a hit piece on Pat McAfee. It’s more about how we should categorize what McAfee does, because The Athletic — you know that sports site owned by The New York Times — named him its Sports Media Person of the Year, and that implies that he’s a journalist....

TNF: The Seahawks are in the playoff hunt, who woulda thunk it?
Week 15 kicks off with an NFC West rivalry between the San Francisco 49ers and the Seattle Seahawks. It’s been a while since a Niners-Seahawks game this late in the season had playoff ramifications for both teams....

No, the San Francisco Giants’ offense isn’t suddenly elite with Carlos Correa
After missing out on Arson Judge, it was only a matter of time before the San Francisco Giants used their massive spending budget on one of the few elite hitters left on the open market. For weeks, the Giants-Carlos Correa speculation had been swirling with some people considering San Fran the front...

It doesn’t matter who the 49ers place under center
The San Francisco 49ers have become the scariest team in the NFL over the last seven weeks of the season. On Sunday, the Niners continued to invoke their dominance over the NFC by shutting down and nearly shutting out Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 35-7. Besides having the best defense in t...

There is a lot more than a championship on the line with Jimmy G’s injury situation
It’s Wednesday, Dec. 7, and there is still no clear picture of the timeline for Jimmy Garoppolo’s return to the field. ...

Baker Mayfield claimed by Rams
Looks like Baker Mayfield is indeed headed to California, but not to the Bay Area to join Kyle Shanahan and the San Francisco 49ers, as many have suspected....

Can the 49ers reset the NFL quarterback market?
If any team can settle the quarterback market a bit it’s the 2022 San Francisco 49ers....

The Eagles look good, but here’s who they should be wary of in the playoffs
The Philadelphia Eagles have dominated the NFC over the first three months of the season en route to a league-best 10-1 start. Besides the game against Washington a couple of weeks ago, Philly has found a way to slither out with a win every time. They’ve already beaten two of the top three teams cha...

Maybe Jimmy G throwing touchdown passes is part of a winning formula
It has been a while since Jimmy Garoppolo threw four touchdown passes in a single game. The last time was Dec. 8, 2019. That day, Garoppolo went toe to toe with Drew Brees, and won 48-46 at the Superdome. That was the game that changed the minds of many who did not believe that Garoppolo could lead ...