This week I have chosen
to take a look back at a more recent game in our history, the 2008
week 3 matchup with the Detroit Lions.
I must confess that the
reason for choosing this is entirely personal, as it was the game
where I was finally able to fulfil my childhood dream of watching the
49ers play at Candlestick Park.
Ever since I was old
enough to pick up a ball - the first I can remember being an American
football - I had wanted to visit the home of the 49ers.
I grew up in the 80s
and 90s reading and watching anything I could get my hands on about
the game and our team.
And at the centre of it
all was always Candlestick Park, the place where Joe, Jerry, Steve
and countless other heroes played out the dreams of myself and
thousands of others.
Living over 5,000 miles
away, and before the internet changed everything, made San Francisco,
its players and its stadium even more magical and in 2008 I was
fortunate enough to set foot in there to watch a game. Bliss.
They say you should
never meet your heroes for you shall always be disappointed. Whilst
that may be true sometimes, thankfully on this occasion it most
certainly was not.
With each year that has passed since the game, my memories have become even more entwined
with my childhood dreams, making 'The Stick' even more iconic.
OK, enough with the
romanticism, those of us who can recall 2008 can remember that it was
hardly a vintage year on or off the field.
However it was a
significant year that can be remembered as the beginning of the end
of a bleak era that began in the early 2000s and did not come to a
close until the hiring of Jim Harbaugh which signalled our latest,
more successful epoch.
This game with the
Lions proved to be both the last home game and the last win in Mike
Nolan's tenure as Niners head coach.
Nolan was fired in Week
8 after a loss to the New York Giants gave the team a 2-6 record
going into their bye week.
Mike Singletary took
over as head coach until the end of the season and won the job on a
permanent basis after inspiring a turnaround that saw the 49ers
finish 7-9.
The 2008 season was
also the year of the Mike Martz offense, when the
orchestrator of 'the greatest show on turf' moved his unique
offensive playbook from Detroit to San Francisco.
Quarterback and former
first overall pick Alex Smith was soon to be placed on injured
reserved due to a broken bone in
his shoulder, an injury caused by a wire left in it from a previous
surgery actually cutting through the bone!
With Smith out of the
picture the starting Quarterback was J.T. O'Sullivan, a player who
arrived to little fanfare as he signed from Detroit along with Martz,
primarily because he knew the Martz offense better than anyone.
Legendary wide receiver
Isaac Bruce, who made his name with Martz at the St. Louis Rams, was
brought over in free agency.
By this point, though,
Bruce was well past his best, but he still proved to be a useful
addition to a rather lacklustre receiving core.
The 2008 draft will go
down as one of the worst in franchise history.
Newly promoted general
manager Scott McLoughin oversaw a draft that included only six picks
due to the team being fined a fifth round pick for alleged
tampering.
None of the six players
selected are with the team, first-round pick Kentwan Balmer was never
able to realise his potential and endured a dismal NFL career.
After being released by
the 49ers, the defensive lineman spent time at Seattle, Carolina and
finally Washington.
Balmer mysteriously
disappeared from the Washington team hotel during preseason in 2012,
with team officials unable unable to contact him for over a week. No
explanation was provided and, in an even stranger development, he was
not officially cut from the team until earlier this year, almost two
years later.
Alway from the demise of
Mike Nolan and the emergence of Mike Singletary, two of the primary occurences that signalled the
beginning of the Niners' re-emergence came with the signing of
Cincinnati Bengals defensive lineman Justin Smith and the shellacking of Vernon
Davis by coac Singletary.
If Singletary is to be
commended for anything during his time with the 49ers, aside from his
sterling work with the team's linebacking core prior to his promotion, then he
must surely be recognised for changing the fortunes of Vernon Davis
who is now one of the elite tight ends in the game.
Its easy to forget just
how different things were for Davis in 2008.
Up until then he had
been a top end first-round pick who had never come close to delivering on his potential.
Sure, he had the most natural
athletic ability possibly ever seen in a player, with size and speed
stats that wowed everybody, but he'd never stood out on the field and was becoming more openly frustrated as time went on.
The tipping point for
him occurred during Singletary's first game in charge, when Davis was
penalised for slapping an opposing Seattle player after a play.
Singletary's response was to send his starting tight end to the locker
room after a heated exchange of words on the sideline.
During the post-game press conference the head coach gave his most famous soundbite:
“I will not tolerate
players who think its about them....I would rather play with 10
people...Cannot play with them, cannot win with them, cannot coach
with them, can't do it! I want winners!”
Singletary's decision to publicly admonish the former Maryland star had a profound effect on Davis, who turned into a completely different player.
The physical beast who just couldn’t catch was suddenly
spending hours on the practice field with a JUGS machine, as well as
improving his route running, play recognition and blocking skills.
He also brought a new maturity and team spirit into his play and
quickly became recognised as one of the locker room leaders, a far
cry from what he is believed to have been the case before Singletary took over.
Six years on and we
have a player who excels at blocking, is the fastest player on the
team, is known to have a great pair of hands and is widely regarded
as being a fantastic team leader and role model. And to think,
without Singletary and his lambasting of Davis, we may never of had
'The Grab' during the 2011 playoff win over the New Orleans Saints!
Justin Smith came to San Francisco on a six-year $45million dollar contract. That seemed like a lot of money in 2008, but the signing has certainly worked out.
49er great Bryant Young retired after the end of
the 2007 season and the team needed to find a suitable replacement
for the man who had carried the defense (and the team) for so many
years.
They found him in the Missouri native, who had just spent his
first seven seasons in Cincinnati and has taken on the mantle from Young, amassing 41.5 sacks and 276 tackles for the 49ers.
After a fairly decent
7-9 season in 2007, the Lions were looking to become a playoff team in 2008.
Instead the Lions suffered a spectacular downturn as they became the first team since
1976 to lose every regular season game, finishing 0-16 in what was
their 75th year as the Detroit Lions.
Even with this pitiful
record, they still had talent in several key areas of the field,
especially at receiver, where they had Calvin Johnson and Roy Williams in
what as at the time regarded to be the best pair of wideouts in the
league.
However, Williams was traded to the Dallas Cowboys just threeweeks
later for first, third and sixth round
picks in the following year's draft.
Onto the game.
Played before a
capacity crowd and in an unusually hot Candlestick Park, the 49ers
got on the board first when O'Sullivan found Bruce wide open in the back of the endzone for a six-yard touchdown.
During the second
quarter Frank Gore capped off a fast six-play drive with a four- yard TD
run out of a four-wide formation.
This was a typical
Martz offensive rush play, coming out of a multiple receiver
formation. Martz is mainly known for his passing offense, which
was always prioritised over therunning game.
After a 44-yard field
goal by Detroit, the 49ers put together another impressive drive with
multiple long completions, including the final 23-yard
touchdown pass to tight end Delanie Walker that put San Francisco ahead 21-3 at half-time.
The 49ers got the ball
to start the second half and were driving nicely before the Lions' defense stiffened.
Joe Nedney attempted a 47-yard field goal but it was no good. Detroit then pulled back 3 more
points thanks to a monstrous 51-yard FG by their long-time kicker
Jason Hanson, making it 21-6.
During the fourth quarter the 49ers had another nice drive going that stalled at Detroit's one-yard line.
It was fourth and goal. The
kicking team came onto the field but the crowd were raucous and
begging Nolan and co to go for 6 points.
After some hesitation a
timeout was called and the kicking unit came back off the field!
Lining up in a three-wide formation with newly acquired cornerback and return man Allan Rossum in the
slot position to the right of the QB, the 49ers prepared themselves
for the play.
The ball was snapped to
O'Sullivan and he handed it off to the speedy Rossum, who at this
point was at full pace running parallel to the line of scrimmage.
Rossum evaded a defender
at the seven-yard line before making like a rocket towards the corner of
the endzone, where he dived football first in for the score!
That spectacular fourth-down goal-line play made the score 28-6.
The 49ers, who at the time were not accustomed to holding such a large lead, unsurprisingly grew a little complacent as the fourth- quarter
clock ticked down.
A simple Detroit screen
pass that should have been stopped before the line of scrimmage
ended up going for a 34-yard touchdown late in the game, cutting the advantage to 15 points.
There was enough time
for Joe Nedney to tack on another three points, though, and ensure a 31-13 San Francisco win.
With this win, the
49ers were 2-1 but their promising start did not deliver a season of success as the Niners endured another campaign of turmoil.
It was not a team
brimming with legendary players,
it had a quarterback who would rapidly disappear off of the face of
the earth not long after, and it was a mediocre year overall, but
this game and the team of 2008 shall always occupy a special place in
my heart as they were the team that I actually saw play at
Candlestick Park.
It contained the
backbone of the side that we watch today, including stars such as
Frank Gore, Patrick Willis, Joe Staley, Vernon Davis and Justin
Smith.
Nolan began 2008
as head coach by by the end of that year it was Singletary's role.
Singletary went on to coach the team for the next two years, with the appointment of Jimmy Raye as offensive coordinator the worst of a long list of failures.
These events brought on a desire to go 'new school' in
2011 and hire a younger, experienced, successful and more
contemporary coach in the form of Harbaugh. The rest, as they say, is history.
This game was one of
the bright spots of an average and unspectacular year.
Yet it was a year
that began the turnaround the fans had wanted for so long and so, for the reasons outlined above, 2008
was a pretty important year in 49er history.
Thanks for reading,
Paul Kadwill
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