Heavyweight Friends: 49ers Offensive Mastermind Kyle Shanahan Will Try To Solve Eagles' Vic Fangio

PHILADELPHIA - Perhaps the most interesting matchup during Sunday’s Wild Card Weekend matchup between the San Francisco 49ers and the Philadelphia Eagles isn’t player vs. player.

All eyes will be on the best-perceived offensive mind in the business, 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan, matching wits with the league's defensive kingpin, Eagles’ defensive coordinator Vic Fangio.

The two masterminds are friends, but the stars haven’t aligned often when it comes to testing each other, and you have to go back to 2018 for the last Fangio-Shanahan battle on the field.

“I haven't coached against him in a while. We are friends,” Fangio said. “Almost coached together a couple times, but I haven't gone against him in a while.”

As in most cases, Fangio has the better “record” with his defenses allowing a total of 41 points in four games (11, six, 15, and nine) against Shanahan and his vaunted abilities.

The context to that is that Shanahan’s quarterbacks in those four contests were John Beck, Robert Griffin III, Jimmy Garoppolo, and Nick Mullens, so Fangio isn’t exactly taking bows for the dominance.

Mutual Admiration Society

San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan leaves the field after the game against the Indianapolis Colts at Lucas Oil Stadium. | Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images

In fact, Fangio has tremendous respect for Shanahan’s offensive schemes and designs.

“They have a really good scheme. It's all packaged together very nicely,” said Fangio. “They give you a lot of good motions. Everything they do is with a purpose and they do a really good job of it.

“Obviously, [49ers QB Brock] Purdy operates it very well, [49ers RB Christian] McCaffrey's an elite back, got a good group of receivers, [49ers TE George] Kittle at tight end. I mean, they had a run where they were [the] hottest offense in the league for like six, seven weeks in a row.”

Shanahan has often reciprocated with flowers of his own.

“My hardest [DC to go against] has probably always been Vic Fangio,” Shanahan said in 2019. “He does so many things with his personnel groupings that he puts you in a bind with protections. He ties a lot of stuff together.

“...They figure out what you're doing and then they think about how to stop what you're doing and that's very similar to how I am. I don't just run my offense. I have no idea what I'm going to call until I know what defense I'm visualizing and trying to attack.”

Shanahan had so much respect for Fangio that he tried to hire him when he got the 49ers job, something Fangio briefly spoke about on Tuesday.

That was in 2017 when the Chicago Bears blocked what would have been a lateral move for Fangio, who had been the Niners' DC from 2011 to 2014 under Jim Harbaugh.

It was a move Fangio wanted to make due to his first stint in the Bay Area.

“We had a lot of success there. We won a lot of games, went to three straight championship games, one Super Bowl,” Fangio said. “Really enjoyed it out there. Met my partner [Kathy Maruyama] out there that I'm still with, so I always tell her that that was the best place I've been for that reason.

“I enjoyed it out there. We had a lot of good players, guys that I really enjoyed coaching. Still stay in touch with some of them, like [former 49ers DE] Justin Smith, [former 49ers LB] Patrick Willis, [former 49ers LB] NaVorro Bowman, [former 49ers LB] Ahmad Brooks, [former 49ers LB] Aldon Smith, could go on and on. [Former 49ers S Dashon] Goldson, [former 49ers S Donte] Whitner. We had a lot of good players.”

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