Blame Shanahan, not Lance for Niners loss to Arizona

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Trey Lance is the future of the 49ers. San Francisco needed the rookie quarterback on Sunday.

He came out on top, playing “well enough to win” on his first NFL start, according to 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan.

So if you’re looking for someone to blame for the 49ers’ 17-10 loss to the Cardinals, their third straight loss, miss the kid.

In fact, you should be looking to the head coach.

The 49ers tied the Cardinals 5-0 on Sunday. San Francisco had more offensive yards and had the ball longer. Both teams converted three third downs in Arizona on one attempt less. Arizona landed another first down in the contest. San Francisco, one way or another, had fewer penalty yards than the Cardinals on Sunday, and both teams had turnover.

And defensively, the Niners were also fantastic, holding the NFL’s best offense at 440 yards per game between weeks 5 to 304.

Yes, San Francisco had every reason to win in the wilderness, even with a rookie quarterback in the game. The number 3 pick in last spring’s draft threw for 192 yards and ran for another 89 on Sunday.

“He was posed. He was confident. Trey gave us a chance to win, ”49ers offensive tackle Trent Williams said of Lance.

If Lance had picked up two more, if you were greedy, the game would have been a whole other contest. The difference in the game was San Francisco’s four failures to convert on the fourth try.

Specifically, it was Shanahan’s call on the fourth try.

Shanahan was predictable and unimaginative on most of his Sunday play calls. That verve we saw of him, even when the Niners have limited talent on the pitch, is gone. But it was clearly missing on critical fourth-try calls.

Now, Shanahan deserves credit for pushing the Cardinals into the fourth without risk, without reward, but his uninspired calls and recycled plays didn’t fool Arizona, and the Cardinals aren’t exactly the 1985 Bears.

There was the one-on-11 quarterback dodge that was missing by a yard, the running pass option that was never really an option that was missing a foot, and the exact same resistance piece. game he ran two weeks ago and Arizona has had no problem stopping.

Yes, in the fourth quarter, needing a yard close to the midfielder and Arizona’s sale to stop a Lance from sneaking into the middle, Shanahan’s version of the wrong direction was to get across the pitch by back Kyle Juszczyk, go under the center, take the shot and fall forward.

The only problem: The Niners played the same game two weeks ago, against Green Bay. It was working then and it probably hit its quota.

Arizona might have sniffed the coin. Maybe not. They didn’t really care who carried the ball, as long as it came up in the middle. The Cardinals arrested Juszczyk without incident. Another turnover on the lows.

There were so many assumptions in Sunday’s game for the 49ers. Little had to do with their first start as a quarterback.

Now Lance was barely infallible. He looked like a rookie on several occasions on Sunday. Too many passes have been made on the line of scrimmage and his knockdowns need to be tamed, one has become an interception.

But Lance’s positives in both facets of his game, ground and air, outweighed the negatives.

More importantly, he is an elite athlete playing a position where this kind of talent becomes mandatory.

Lance followed Arizona quarterback Kyler Murray, the league’s MVP for five games. It is not luck.

Both can run into the backfield to extend plays, rush past the line of scrimmage for great distance, and shoot laser beams all over the pitch. Murray made a few more plays and did a little better in the decision making, but the margin was tight.

And although they only scored 10 points, the Niners moved the ball on Sunday.

Since Lance resumed the 49ers’ offense, they’ve averaged 6.12 yards per game.

Excluding a Week 1 performance against arguably the NFL’s worst team, the Lions, the Niners’ offense averaged 4.84 yards per game with Jimmy Garoppolo at the helm.

What is 1.28 yards worth per set?

In the NFL, it’s the difference between having an attack in the top 10 and the third worst in the league.

This difference seems worth exploring further, even when Garoppolo returns from his calf injury. The Niners are hoping they will return after this week off.

Let’s see if Shanahan made the right choice there.

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