San Francisco 49ers: 5 ways to be contenders in NFC
The San Francisco 49ers have been a laughing stock for the past few seasons, now with a new coach and general manager it’s time for the Niners to be contenders.
The San Francisco 49ers have been pretty awful the last few seasons. But with a new general manager and a new coach, they have a chance to be relevant and competitive sooner rather than later. Here’s the five things they need to do in order for Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch to restore some shine to the city by the bay.
– Find your franchise quarterback in the draft
Step one should be and might be the easiest one if San Francisco wants to be competitive inside a 2-3 season window. The 49ers’ quarterback situation hasn’t been stable since Alex Smith exited and Colin Kaepernick took over. Now, the 49ers have a new coach and general manager, which usually means one thing: there may be a change coming under center.
With Deshaun Watson, DeShone Kizer and Mitch Trubisky all looking to go early in the first round of the draft, it would be the perfect for San Fransisco. Time to start a new era in San Fran.
– Overhaul the defense
Ranking dead last in total defense, the 49ers hallmark for the last decade has been their defense. They are still feeling the aftershocks of Jim Harbaugh’s departure and defection after defection of a defense he helped build. With John Lynch, I expect the Niners to take a majority of defensive players with their 11 picks in the 2017 draft.
In recent interviews, Lynch came out and has stressed that he wants to make moves particularly on the defensive side. When looking at projected drafts from NFL.com to Walter Football, they’ve got the 49ers going strong on defense. This year is a fantastic place to start that.
– Jed York keeps takes a step back
49ers owner Jed York was highly visible in the post-Harbaugh era as he trotted out coaches and had to assure the media and the wavering fan base that all is well. Clearly it wasn’t. Now, with a new coach and general manager in place it would be a good time for York to go into the background and not have a meddling presence.
The more visible York was, the more unstable the franchise seemed when it came to the media and the public. If York can trust Lynch and Shanahan with building the team than Jed can keep a much lower profile in the owners booth.
– Be quick but efficient in team building
Building a team in the NFL takes about 3-5 seasons on average and with the impatience of most owners, general managers and fans these days it seems like that window gets shorter every few seasons. One good thing that the 49ers did with Trent Baalke and Harbaugh is that they built a team piece by piece, and didn’t rush with putting a team together.
Some teams will construct a squad over the next few seasons and will put guys who aren’t in position to succeed or pick a guy who flames out quicker which starts the cycle all over again. If the 49ers can be patient, make smart decisions with people like Lynch who knows football. In the long run, despite his lack of front office experience, they will have some success with this new regime.
– Build to compete in the division, the rest will come in time.
Too often, teams with a new general manager and or coach put together a a squad to fit their philosophy. While that might seem good from out outset, a team might have the wrong plan in being successful when it comes to building a winner. I’d like to see the 49ers scan their division and see what weakness they can expose out of teams they’ll be seeing twice a season.
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If you see that Seattle is struggling with an aging secondary, that’s when you get receivers and develop and offense built on speed on the outside. Shanahan had something like that in Atlanta over the last few seasons and we saw how that worked out. San Francisco has the chance to build a contender in an NFC that is becoming wide open over the next few seasons. Use these five steps and they’ll be contenders very soon.