Three-Dot Tuesday 2.13
Kyle Shanahan can win the big one. Just look how long it took the other guy.
Every year I tell the one guy I know who is actually willing to place bets on the Super Bowl for other people that I want “non-QB to throw a TD pass” as my prop bet. Every year. Well, this year that guy was working in Vegas and didn’t get to any sportsbooks all week. And when non-QB Jauan Jennings threw a TD pass to Christian McCaffrey, he texted me five seconds later with “Oh, no.” And I wrote back “EVERY YEAR I TELL YOU THIS” and laughed. Whaddya gonna do?
Friday in this same space I talked about teevee audiences and ratings and things on the 60th anniversary of the Beatles first appearance on Ed Sullivan, which drew a then-record 73 million people who watched on 45.3% of the total teevees available in the country at the time. I noted that although the Super Bowl routinely draws over 100 million people, the last game to actually be watched by over 45% of the total teevees available was the only other Super Bowl that went to overtime, the Patriots 28-3 comeback over the Falcons- and I didn’t mention Atlanta’s offensive coordinator at the time was Kyle Shanahan for good reason. Well, this latest Super Bowl drew a new all-time record (not counting the original moon landing) 120 million viewers on CBS alone. But what it didn’t do was break the 45.3% mark. Since ratings have been tinkered with to now allow out-of-home viewership (aka, the large gatherings at bars and restaurants), that 45.3% mark is going to be hard to break…
“He’s a great offensive mind, but the big game pressure always gets to him.”
The one thing people are trying to hang on 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan is winning the overtime coin flip and taking the ball. The 49ers deferred every time this year they’ve won the toss, except this one. The reasoning, he explained afterwards, was that if the game was tied after both teams had the ball once, the 49ers would be able to win the game with a field goal on their next possession. It’s a little bit of thinking too far ahead and missing what you need to do to win right now, which Shanahan does a lot, but I have no problem with taking the ball- besides, you’re going to try and score a TD regardless of when you get the ball (you know, like every offensive possession you ever get). And you know Patrick Mahomes is going to get points on his drive. The unspoken logic for taking the ball first is that after you score, you are putting more pressure on the other Chiefs to potentially screw up. The problem is, Mahomes made all the big plays himself on that drive…
“Ran into a once-in-a-generation QB.”
This game played out almost exactly how I thought it would, right down to overtime. That’s because I said from the beginning: the 49ers are the better team, but the Chiefs have Patrick Mahomes. You put Mahomes on the 49ers for this game and they win 55-10. That’s not to take anything away from Brock Purdy. He played about as good as you could expect for a second-year-QB. But he’s not Mahomes. Nobody is. The 49ers built a great team. The Chiefs have a good team and the best player on the field, full stop. He’s in his prime and he is unstoppable. I only didn’t want him to win because I’m a 49ers fan. But I believe in recognizing greatness and appreciating greatness when it’s in front of me. Mahomes is that dude…
“Can’t win the big one.”
The worst 49ers playoff finish under Kyle Shanahan: the NFC title game. That’s right. He’s now been head coach of the team seven seasons and missed the playoffs three times: his first two years and then the weird 2020 season. The four playoff appearances: Super Bowl vs. Chiefs, NFC Title game vs. Rams, NFC Title game vs. Eagles, Super Bowl vs. Chiefs. That may be not winning the “big one,” but it’s making sure you’re one of the last four teams to have an opportunity to do so. That’s winning everything but the big one, and there are at least 28 other teams every year who wish they were in that position…
“Maybe he’ll never win a Super Bowl.”
This is an absurd prediction. Especially if you apply it to a guy who’s been a head coach seven years already and is only 44 years old. If he was 64 years old, maybe. But Shanahan has at least 20 good years left as a head coach. To brand him as a “failure” when he hasn’t even hit the halfway mark on his head coaching lifespan- especially considering his four playoff results- is outrageous hyperbole. You know what I had to do next, right? I had to go look and see how old certain rather successful coaches were when they won their first Super Bowl. Almost all of them were in their mid-to-late 40’s. Kyle’s Dad Mike was 45 when the Broncos finally broke through and beat the Falcons in 1999. Bill Parcells, 45. Bill Belichick won his first at age 49, and so did Jimmy Johnson. Bill Walsh, 50. Don Shula was 43 and had already been a head coach for 10 years. The youngest guy to ever win as a head coach was a guy who learned from Kyle and Mike Shanahan, who would be Sean McVay, at 36. And Andy Reid, who is the only guy to have beaten head coach Kyle Shanahan in a Super Bowl, was 61 when he won his first, after 21 years as a head coach…
Oh, and all those bolded quotes about a guy who can’t win the Super Bowl because he’s an offensive genius who gets in his own way or whatever? Those weren’t said about Kyle Shanahan in the last two days (or two years). They were said multiple times about Andy Reid during his 14 years in Philadelphia, especially when he lost in the NFC title game three straight years, and really especially after he finally made a Super Bowl in 2005 and lost to once-in-a-generation QB Tom Brady. And then it got echoed even more during his first six years in Kansas City. And five years later, well, you can see for yourself how that changed. It helps to have a really good QB to change everyone’s mind about you in a big hurry. Let’s see how Brock Purdy helps Kyle Shanahan change the narrative in the next five years…
And if you’re wondering if somebody can really change a narrative that’s dogged them for decades, just check out this piece in the Philadelphia Inquirer about Andy Reid. Philly ran him out of town on a rail and now they’re saying he’s “one of the five best coaches the league has ever seen” Seriously…
How about those Warriors?
A breath of fresh air in the rush to judgment, eyeballs and ears.
153 teams across 5 major professional sports. That means...wait for it...5 championships annually. 3.3% of teams win championships annually. 71 lose their last post-season game. Annually. Yeah, really, really, really hard to win championships.
More on this and the 49rrs post-season success--fans are spoiled--in The Koppett Kat on Monday.
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