Kyle Shanahan Explains why the 49ers Have Scored Just 22 Points per Game this Season
Today, a reporter asked Kyle Shanahan why the 49ers have scored just 22 points per game this season despite all their talent on offense and in the coaching staff. Here's what Shanahan said, courtesy of the 49ers P.R. department.
Q: I know you touched on this a little bit last night about how you want to blow teams out, you want to score a lot and all that. With all the offensive playmakers you have at the skill positions, you guys are averaging 22 points per game, 18th in the league. Is there anything you can put your finger on why things haven't clicked, including last night, on a more regular basis and do you see that things are improving and moving in the direction where the offense can start to carry more of the load here in the second half of the season?
SHANAHAN: “Yeah, I see it every week. I saw we had the opportunity to do that yesterday. Not clicking, we got inside the 10-yard line five times and scored touchdowns on two of them, so I believe if we did on those other three, I feel we would've been clicking huge. We would've had over 30 points and things are going pretty good, so if you go to that game, I think we need to be better inside the 10, but there's lots of things. I thought we were moving it great. I thought guys did a good job. We added one new running back and we lost our leading rusher, so I don't feel like we've added all these new guys. We brought in [RB] Christian [McCaffrey] and we lost [Miami Dolphins RB] Jeff [Wilson Jr.] and I'm real excited about having Christian here, but it's not changing up a ton of stuff. We do what we do and I thought our guys did it a pretty high-level last night, but when you end up scoring only two times and you're inside the ten five times, it's tough to get more than 30 points.”
Q: And so to just follow up on that, then why do you think there was a problem specifically last night inside the red zone or even inside just the 10-yard line?
SHANAHAN: “One, we had a dropped touchdown. Another, we had second-and-goal from the eight I thought we should have scored on a run. One, we through a bubble and I think we shouldn't have, which got us in the third-and-goal from the eight, that was the one that we dropped. And at the very end of the game, I wanted to make sure they used that timeout. Probably would've a better chance of scoring if we threw it from the two there on third-and-goal from the two. I didn’t think that was worth the risk. I wanted to make sure regardless of what happened that they had no timeout, so that was the decision there, but I would say those three things.”
Q: Basically, you're saying a different reason for all of those misfires.
SHANAHAN: “Yeah, there'll always be a reason. There's three times in there that we didn't score, so it'd be a lot easier with film and the tape and to show you exactly, but when you ask like what's going on with an offense, why we're not clicking, that was the answer. I think it comes to points, I think when you're over whatever we were on third down, which is 50% or something, I think that leads the league by a ton. I think we ran for 150 yards, I think we threw for 250. I'd love to have that turnover back that we had, but I do think there were a lot of things clicking, but you're not going to get points if you move it and can't score inside the 10, you're not going to get enough points, that's for sure, but if you want to go to a different game, I can answer those too, but usually, it's hard to just put it in a sentence because it does come down to football plays. It comes down to how you execute them, how you do things, how you play, it's everything.”
