Final Forecast: Just giving the match ups one more look through to see if I missed anything.
If you look at how Minnesota and GB fell to the 49ers this year, you definitely will see some great play by the West Coast team. However, you also see a lot of breaks go the 49ers way. A questionable personal foul on Davante Adams led to the strip sack/quick TD to start the week 12 rout. It was followed by Bulaga going out with injury, and Alex Light getting demolished the rest of the evening. Ill-timed drops by Allison and a catch ruled non-catch on a deep pass to Graham compounded a string of bad luck for the Green and Gold. In the Vikings game, it was still moderately close at only 17-10 favoring the 49ers when Cousins threw a terrible INT while targeting his All-pro receiver… who had an exposed Achilles tendon due to an injury in practice this week. It was soon 24-10. A bad offensive series by Minnesota led to a punt, but a quick forced 3-and-out of the 49er offense followed. However, return man Sherels muffed it, and it was anther score to San Fran. Cousins marched into 49er territory a few times, but with only 5 Cook runs after the first quarter and down 17, they were obvious passing downs. Four of the Niners six sacks were in the final frame. As good as San Francisco has been this year, and they have been fantastic, a lot of luck broke their way at the end of the season with the Rams absolutely blowing coverage to hand the game away, the no PI call to grab the #1 seed, and with the elements highlighted above in their last two games against the NFC North playoff teams. I still am confident San Francisco can win this game. Lucky teams go far. The Packers have benefited from Phantom Hands to the Face calls, injury plagued Minnesota, Detroit, and Seattle teams, and two rookie QBs leading poor supporting casts in 3 of their final 7 game to grab the #2 seed. If the Packers can play assignment-sound football on defense and Rodgers can find hot reads on offense, I can see a different outcome. I would not at all be surprised to see the Packers win, but I expect the 49ers still win, 31-28.
If you look at how Minnesota and GB fell to the 49ers this year, you definitely will see some great play by the West Coast team. However, you also see a lot of breaks go the 49ers way. A questionable personal foul on Davante Adams led to the strip sack/quick TD to start the week 12 rout. It was followed by Bulaga going out with injury, and Alex Light getting demolished the rest of the evening. Ill-timed drops by Allison and a catch ruled non-catch on a deep pass to Graham compounded a string of bad luck for the Green and Gold. In the Vikings game, it was still moderately close at only 17-10 favoring the 49ers when Cousins threw a terrible INT while targeting his All-pro receiver… who had an exposed Achilles tendon due to an injury in practice this week. It was soon 24-10. A bad offensive series by Minnesota led to a punt, but a quick forced 3-and-out of the 49er offense followed. However, return man Sherels muffed it, and it was anther score to San Fran. Cousins marched into 49er territory a few times, but with only 5 Cook runs after the first quarter and down 17, they were obvious passing downs. Four of the Niners six sacks were in the final frame. As good as San Francisco has been this year, and they have been fantastic, a lot of luck broke their way at the end of the season with the Rams absolutely blowing coverage to hand the game away, the no PI call to grab the #1 seed, and with the elements highlighted above in their last two games against the NFC North playoff teams. I still am confident San Francisco can win this game. Lucky teams go far. The Packers have benefited from Phantom Hands to the Face calls, injury plagued Minnesota, Detroit, and Seattle teams, and two rookie QBs leading poor supporting casts in 3 of their final 7 game to grab the #2 seed. If the Packers can play assignment-sound football on defense and Rodgers can find hot reads on offense, I can see a different outcome. I would not at all be surprised to see the Packers win, but I expect the 49ers still win, 31-28.
With Tennessee at KC, I haven’t seen anything to change this prediction. If Chris Jones is a go for KC and Jack Conklin is out for the Titans, just swap 3 points from Tennessee to KC. It is lazy on my part, but this team is deep with talented speed on offense. Hill, Watkins, and Hardman are bad enough, but Kelce elevated himself to Kittle/Gronk level last week. IF Kittle is the #1 TE ahead of Kelce, Travis has to be 1B. And the KC defense really only gave up 2 TD drives last week. Against Fuller and Hopkins and Fells, the pass defense did phenomenal, even in surrendering over 350 passing yards to Watson. The Houston ground attack was negligible. The team played lights out. Tennessee was nearly perfect last week against Baltimore, but Kansas City has a wider range of healthy weapons to play mismatch with. Tannehill will NEED to make hay against this somewhat vulnerable defense to bring the Titans back to the Superbowl, and he will need to not make negative plays or commit turnovers. I don’t see Tennessee having a deep enough stable of pass defenders or offensive weapons to win this one. 38-34, Kansas City.
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