There are myriad reasons the 49ers lost the Super Bowl in February. Losses are rarely ever defined by a single play. But in the 49ers' case, there were two clear protection breakdowns that cost them on a pair of potentially game-winning plays.
I detailed those protection breakdowns here after talking to Jake Brendel, Spencer Burford and Brock Purdy after the game. There was a 3rd-and-5 at the Kansas City 35-yard line with two minutes left in the fourth quarter in which Trent McDuffie went unblocked, and Purdy threw to Jauan Jennings instead of a wide open Brandon Aiyuk.
Purdy said this week that it's a play that haunts him and he should've thrown the ball to Aiyuk.
The second play was a 3rd-and-4 at the Kansas City 18-yard line with 7:29 remaining. Again, Purdy had to throw a ball up to Jennings. Both Jennings and Aiyuk won on their routes. But Burford blew the protection, leaving Chris Jones unblocked.
Burford also cost the 49ers a would-be touchdown earlier in the game on a deceptive play that left Deebo Samuel wide open. Jones beat Burford to force an incompletion.
That's the context. TBurford was open and honest, and perhaps to harsh on himself after the game. But Friday morning, offensive line coach/run game coordinator Chris Foerster took responsiblity.
He gave a lengthy answer, as he usually does. It was insightful and sincere.
The full answer as it relates to Burford's blame and response, is above. The start of answer, when Foerster mentions "it," refers to mistakes. He admits bluntly that the offensive line played poorly.
"We pick this game to not play our best game, but it happens," Foerster said. "It's a game. You go out and you go play it. And we didn't play very well. And [Burford] makes that mistake.
"I struggle with it. It's my fault. I prepare him to play. It's my job to get him to do it. And yeah, it's my fault. And he didn't have it down. Banks missed a similar thing earlier in the game. Nobody talks about that one. It was a pressure, and I think he got the ball out, but it wasn't covered good enough.
Or if it was, they didn't get it because if they don't get it, I can't just say their fault, not mine. Heck no. I'm responsible for those knuckleheads and if those knuckleheads don't do it right? I'm the knucklehead, I'm the guy that's not doing the job right. I'm the guy that has to get them to do it.
"But I can promise you as much as it weighs on me, it weighs on [Burford] more because he's the one with the bright light on him. Nobody took the camera over to me and said, ‘There's the idiot that didn't get him prepared properly.’ It’s hard. And coming back from that has been hard. And the conversations with him at the end when he came in my office, after the game, it was hard. It matters. This guy doesn't just go, ‘Oh, missed my assignment.’ No, I mean, it's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
"So yeah, it was tough on all of us and tough on him in particular, but he's been great. He's come back, bounced back well, and he's done a good job. And I love the guy. He’s doing everything right to hopefully fix a lot of those things that went wrong.”
Foerster has long been a proponent of coaching being able to maximize talent. He stated after the draft that he prefers the 49ers to go for skill position players as opposed to offensive linemen in early rounds, because there's a cutoff for skill players. With offensive linemen, he thinks he can get good production from mid-to-late-round talent.
With that context, it's clear that while Foerster is admitting his players' mistakes, he's genuinely taking them as his own. Now, the looming questions over the offensive line are when Trent Williams returns, who will start at right guard... or whether there's no clear starter there.
