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Predicting the Final Score of the 49ers-Dolphins Game

The 49ers won't have Elijah Mitchell, and they might not have Deebo Samuel, either.
Grant Cohn|
Predicting the Final Score of the 49ers-Dolphins Game
Predicting the Final Score of the 49ers-Dolphins Game

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San Francisco 49ers

This game feels like a toss up.

The 49ers are four-point favorites over the Dolphins, and homefield advantage accounts for three of those points, which means these teams are fairly evenly matched. Plus it's supposed to rain in Santa Clara on Sunday, which could make the game a muddy mess.

The Dolphins pose the biggest challenge the 49ers have faced since they lost by three touchdowns to the Kansas City Chiefs. And while Miami has its flaws like every team does, it also has a head coach in Mike McDaniel who currently seems more creative than his former mentor, 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan. In addition, the Dolphins have a quarterback in Tua Tagovailoa who seems better than 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo. Tagovailoa is the NFL's top-ranked passer, plus he's 8-0 this season when he starts and finishes games. Meanwhile, Jimmy Garoppolo has played well the past month, but he's still Jimmy Garoppolo.

To make matters even tougher, the 49ers won't have Elijah Mitchell, and they might not have Deebo Samuel, either -- he has a deep thigh bruise and he hardly practiced this week.

But the Dolphins have injury issues, too. They won't have either of their starting offensive tackles, which means the 49ers defensive line should dominate. Expect Nick Bosa, Arik Armstead, Charles Omenihu and Samson Ebukam to create constant pressure, which won't allow Tagovailoa to hold the ball long enough to throw it downfield to the Dolphins ultrafast wide receivers Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle.

The 49ers have a legitimately great defense which will take advantage of the Dolphins holes on offense.

Unfortunately for the Dolphins, they don't have a great defense. The have a legitimately bad defense on the road, where it has allowed a league-worst 32.8 points per game. So even if Deebo Samuel doesn't play, the 49ers should have more than enough talent to score at least 20 points. And with their great defense, 20 points should be enough to win in the rain.

FINAL SCORE PREDICTION: 49ers 20, Dolphins 17.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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