San Francisco 49ers: Previewing the Atlanta Falcons

The San Francisco 49ers were expected to have a rough year. Thanks to all the off-season losses and departures, they weren’t set up to dominate the 2015 season. In fact, the words ‘dominate’ and ’49ers’ usually only appears in the same sentence when it’s a national news outlet talking about the 49ers getting dominated.

Unfortunately, the climate of the 49ers this year has been simply toxic. Long-time play-maker turned pass dropper Vernon Davis had been demanding a trade, and allegedly calling out Colin Kaepernick, for quite some time. Thankfully, he was traded to the Denver Broncos this week in an attempt to alleviate the locker room concerns, which is only one of many moves needed to turn the ship around.

Fans aren’t happy with the product on the field, coached by a line coach that probably shouldn’t be in this position, or the moves off the field, like to the decision to cut Australian rugby sensation Jarryd Hayne, or to continue to trust Kaepernick to lead the team. 

Kaepernick has now been officially benched, in favor of former Jacksonville Jaguar Blaine Gabbert. In what has become quite the repetitive warning, all signs point to Gabbert being just as bad if not worse than Kaepernick.

The 49ers were running low at running back before the game against the St.Louis Rams last weekend, having lost Carlos Hyde for an undetermined amount of time and without Hayne. Any depth they thought they still had was shredded during the game from Mike Davis injuring his hand and Reggie Bush tearing his ACL when he slid on the irresponsibly exposed concrete on the sidelines of the Edward Jones Dome.

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The game was slow, penalty-filled, and ultimately brutal to watch. The 49ers never got any sense of offense going, and weren’t able to contain the explosive rookie runner Todd Gurley. This week doesn’t get any easier for the boys from the bay, as they host the dangerous Atlanta Falcons offense. If they want to come away with their third win on the year, they really need to step it up.

The defense will have their hands full trying to contain the likes of Matt Ryan, Julio Jones, and Devonta Freeman. Thus far, Jones leads all receivers in both receptions and yards in 2015. That’s a very scary threat the secondary is facing. It doesn’t get any easier on the ground, as the rookie Freeman is the leading rusher in nearly every measurable statistic this year.

Next: What Does Blaine Gabbert Mean For The 49ers Offense?

As if the 49ers needed another reason to be worried about the game, someone had the bright idea of calling out the Falcons’ defense, by anonymously stating that they were waiting to start Gabbert until they faced a ‘weak’ defense. It’s pretty apparent whoever said this about the Falcons has no idea what ‘bulletin-board’ material is.

This is literally only going to make a cranky Falcons team, coming off a loss at home to the lowly Buccaneers, more fired up and ready to shut the 49ers down. This game won’t be pretty, but then again, are any 49ers games this year?