Recently in Matchups Category

Mike Singletary wants to make sure his players understand tomorrow's game against the Vikings is not all about Adrian Peterson or Brett Favre. But, clearly, the 49ers must keep those players in check Sunday to have any chance of leaving Minnesota with a victory.

 

This is the weekend's only matchup of unbeaten NFL teams. The 49ers have victories at the Cardinals and at home against the Seahawks, while the Vikings have road wins against the Browns and Lions.

 

The Vikings and 49ers have similar offensive approaches. Both teams want to get their run games going. Quarterbacks Favre and Shaun Hill have been bit players in their teams' success. Hill stepped up when needed with a long game-winning drive at the start of the fourth quarter of the 49ers' win at Arizona. And Favre has three touchdown passes - but very few yards passing. He arrived late in training camp and is still trying to build chemistry with his wideouts.

 

This is the regular-season home debut for Favre, so you know he'll be excited. Peterson is also determined to play well against the 49ers after he had the worst game of his career against the 49ers in 2007. Peterson had 3 yards rushing on 14 attempts.

 

Coach Mike Nolan, who was handling most of the game-planning at that stage, stacked the line of scrimmage, as the 49ers were not concerned with rookie quarterback Tavaris Jackson making them pay. He also had cornerbacks Nate Clements and Walt Harris coming up aggressively to shut off the outside.

 

The 49ers constantly had at least four defenders in position to make plays. Bryant Young and Aubrayo Franklin had a big games in the middle, and Marques Douglas and Parys Haralson were very disciplined on the outside. Derek Smith, Jeff Ulbrich and, of course, Patrick Willis played well, and Mark Roman and Michael Lewis also came up strong in run support throughout the game.

 

The key matchup might happen on the other side of the ball. Listen to my thoughts below:

 

 

 

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The much-anticipated NFL regular-season debut of running back Thomas Clayton might happen tomorrow.
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There were a lot of other duties that took precedence today.
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The team arrived at its Amherst, N.Y., hotel late last night. So even though the 49ers are 3-27 since 2003 in those 10 a.m. (Pacific) starts, it appears as if they have decided to show up and play the game against the Bills, anyway.
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Last week's GPS game against the Seahawks Rams (or whichever dreadful team they played) established that the 49ers are not the worst team in the NFL. In fact, the 49ers would pick No. 7 overall if the draft were held today.
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When it was revealed a year ago 49ers director of football operations Paraag Marathe was in the booth on game days, helping with rules and replays, it caused a lot of people to question the wisdom of coach Mike Nolan's decision.
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Here is a dose of intriguing matchups for tonight's 49ers game against the Cardinals in the desert.

 

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When Chris Foerster replaced George Warhop as a position coach it turns out that wasn't the only change on the offensive line.
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Just arrived in New Jersey. The team will be touching down a little later this evening.
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There might be someone new wearing the green dot on the 49ers' defense Sunday against the Eagles.
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When the schedule came out, you could mark this one down as a 49ers loss. Now, things look a lot different. The Patriots aren't nearly as imposing without QB Tom Brady.

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Tomorrow has not yet arrived, but tomorrow's paper has. Here's my article, "Martz's deep pass routes testing offensive line."

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This is not a GPS game, per se, but you can certainly look at this four-week stretch that begins Sunday as an indicator of where the 49ers stand in the NFL.
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Since the 2004 season, the 49ers have played 67 games. They've won 19 games during that time. But here's an amazing fact: The 49ers have won only two games by more than a touchdown.
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