Heavyweight bout or Saturday rout?
Seahawks-49ers: Most important
Could Seahawks-49ers be the “Paul-Joshua” to Sunday night’s “Paul-Tyson”?
I’ll explain.
I have only ever seen one Jake Paul fight and like many of you probably that was the one against Mike Tyson. The curiosity to see Tyson got the best of me and I wasn’t alone as Netflix reported that over 100 million people tuned in worldwide last November, the most-streamed sporting event in history until Netflix beat it a month later with their Christmas Day NFL games.
So I’m not that well-informed about Paul’s fighting history, but I know enough to know that he usually scheduled fights that he could win. A 58-year old Mike Tyson; family members of famous boxers; older MMA fighters without boxing credibility; or Nate Robinson. Through his first 13 fights, Paul went 12-1 and for a minute there he kind of fooled boxing, as he was ranked by the WBA after his win over Julio Caesar Chavez….Junior. (The one who isn’t a boxing legend.)
Then Paul faced Anthony Joshua, an actual 36-year-old professional boxer, and apparently he got knocked out, had his jaw broken, and is considering retiring from boxing.
When people say that the 49ers legitimized their place among the greats by beating the Bears this week, to me that’s like saying that Jake Paul became a real boxer when he beat Mike Tyson 21 years after his last win.
Yeah, Chicago is 11-5. But by DVOA (Defense-Adjusted Value Over Average), the Bears are ranked 24th on defense, which is still better than San Francisco’s ranking at 27th. The Seahawks are 1st. Against the pass, Chicago ranks 24th, and against the run they are 29th. Seattle is 2nd against the pass, a hair behind the Houston Texans defense, but against the run the Seahawks lead over second place is monumental.
In the playoff field, the worst defense belongs to the San Francisco 49ers. The third-worst belongs to the Chicago Bears.
Offensively, it’s true that the 49ers rank second behind the L.A. Rams. But Seattle’s hardly in a bad spot, ranking 11th overall and only one spot behind the Bears. By passing DVOA, the difference is negligible, as the Seahawks are 5th, two spots ahead of Chicago.
I’ve seen a lot more football games than I have seen Jake Paul fights, so I know that being the better team on paper doesn’t always amount to a sixth round knockout. Just a couple of weeks ago, people were saying that the Rams were a better team than the Seahawks “on paper” and we know how that turned out.
However, every season a team wins a lot more games than they should because of one-score luck, they reach the playoffs, and they get punched in the mouth. Sam Darnold was on one of those teams last year. That team in 2025 is the Bears.
So aside from beating Chicago on the final play and giving up 38 points, San Francisco’s last truly impressive win was three months ago (26-23 OT on TNF to the Rams). And that alone may not be enough reason to be skeptical—you play the schedule you’re dealt—but to be dealt that schedule AND you have the worst defense in the entire playoff field?
The 49ers should have scheduled the Seattle Seahawks, Jr. instead.
By the way, I started sharing the YouTube Channel “Fourth and Film” in the offseason and sadly the channel got off my radar during the season because I recently discovered these amazing play breakdowns that they’re doing every week. Here’s Week 17’s, with 2 relevant examples in the 49ers-Bears game:
Most Important Players
LT Austen Pleasents, 49ers
LT Josh Jones, Seahawks
Charles Cross is out. Trent Williams is trending to be ruled out. Josh Jones is trending to be active and start a third game in a row. This would be the first start of Pleasents’ career, a former 2020 undrafted free agent. So this is his sixth season in the league.
You’d always prefer to have a full deck, but if the Seahawks had to choose one key starter to miss the 49ers game then left tackle actually isn’t a bad choice given that San Francisco has had the worst pass rush in the NFL.
Nick Bosa is still tied for third on the 49ers in sacks…folks, he hasn’t played since the first quarter of week 3.
Compare that to a Seahawks defense that has four players with at least two more sacks than San Francisco’s leader in sacks. Even Drake Thomas and Nick Emmanwori would both rank third on the 49ers in sacks.
The changes at left tackle for both teams may not prove to be that significant on Saturday—with a week to prepare for this, both teams know what to expect and will have a plan for it—but both teams are also flirting with practice squad reserves coming into the game because they’ve gotten so thin at tackle.
WR Cooper Kupp, Seahawks
Going out on a limb for this one and here’s why:
If the 49ers truly want to key in on Jaxon Smith-Njigba—or the Seahawks just want to key in on San Francisco’s tremendous weakness in the secondary behind CB1 Deommodore Lenoir—then which Seattle receiver steps up?
Obvious answer: Rashid Shaheed.
“Cool Story” answer: The guy who has been struggling to have his defining Seahawks game all year.
If Shaheed isn’t 100% or just not quite the guy getting open, Kupp might sneak up on fans as a veteran who once put up a career-high 14 catches against the 49ers a few years ago. If you remember, Kupp was also the guy who would have been a wide open touchdown in Week 1 if Lucas hadn’t been knocked back by Bosa into Darnold, causing him to fumble.
He almost had that defining moment immediately and against the 49ers.
It’s doubtful that Kupp’s career with the Seahawks will last much longer, so what a great opportunity this is to do something special for his hometown team.
Some of the top single-game marks against the 49ers this season were “number 2” or “number 3” receivers, including:
Michael Wilson, Cardinals
Davante Adams, Rams
Luther Burden, Bears
Alec Pierce, Colts
Xavier Hutchinson, Texans
Even if it’s just a touchdown, this could be Kupp’s last best chance. Or if it’s Shaheed, that works too.
Today’s “most important” is a little truncated. Who would be on your list?
More film:
I posted mine yesterday, so I'll just mention my overall 'most important' for this game is Klint Kubiak. He's got to find the right opening sequence of plays. He's got to make things as easy as he can make them for Sam, especially early in the game. Hopefully we can find some running plays that keep us on schedule, and make those 3rd down conversions managable. Get the 9'ers defence on their heels, and then run your play action games to JSN.
These slow starts on offence can be for any number of reasons. Poor execution, being too predictable, not coming out with enough urgency, getting tricked by the defence into checking from a good play to a bad one, etc, etc. But as Klint said in his media session this week, it can't continue and it's on him and the players to get it fixed. A solid day running the football would be a huge help in that.
I should be more anxious about this game, but I'm not at all. Team is prepared, and win or lose, we'll be in the dance and can seek our retribution on the road in the playoffs if necessary.
I don't think Mike Macdonald will win the coach of the year award this year, just because of teams like New England and San Fran. New Englands been such a big turnaround, and San Fran has survived many key player losses, and kept on winning. But I'm on team Macdonald. Not a classier coach in the league, players love him, he's really patient with the media, respects the hell out of the 12's, and everything he does is so well thought out. I love how he absolutely despises losing. That's great motivation not to. Love the guy, so he's my COTY, but I may be somewhat biased.
Since I don’t have much faith in Kupp, Barner is my key offensive player. AJ seems to be at his best in big games; a keep-the-Niners-honest night of 5-6 receptions for 65-70 yards isn’t an unreasonable hope.
On defense, what a great opportunity for Emmanwori to wreak havoc. He’s likely key to containing McCaffrey—I say that he’s up to it.