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49ers Aim to be Faster and More Exotic on Defense Under Robert Saleh

Tony Pauline says he has spoken to 49ers assistant coaches at the Shrine Bowl practices about these upcoming changes.
Grant Cohn|
Sep 9, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh (left) greets San Francisco 49ers linebacker Fred Warner (right) after the game at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images
Sep 9, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh (left) greets San Francisco 49ers linebacker Fred Warner (right) after the game at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images | Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

Robert Saleh has been the 49ers defensive coordinator for just two days, and already reports and rumors are flying about how he's going to change the defense.

Tony Pauline says he has spoken to 49ers assistant coaches at the Shrine Bowl practices about these upcoming changes.

"Niners coaches here at the Shrine Bowl practice have outlined what the plan is and hopes are for 2025," writes Pauline. "A major priority will be to increase team speed on defense, specifically in the secondary, via the draft and free agency. There also is a cry to be more innovative on defense. The team was criticized for being too vanilla on defense and never moving away from the base package. The belief is they will be a bit more exotic next season and throw in a lot more wrinkles and surprises."

Let's try to decode Pauline's report.

Increasing team speed in the secondary could mean letting Talanoa Hufanga leave in free agency. Hufanga is a former All Pro who plays with terrific instincts, but he's not fast. He ran a 4.64 at his Pro Day, and that was before he tore his ACL. And remember, Saleh never coached Hufanga. The 49ers drafted him when DeMeco Ryans was their defensive coordinator. Perhaps the Texans will sign Hufanga.

Being more innovate on defense could mean calling more five-man pressures and man-to-man coverages on third down. That's what Robert Saleh did when he was the defensive coordinator with the 49ers the first time and he was quite effective.

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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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