What the 49ers said after losing to the Cardinals in their season finale
The 49ers capped a disappointing, injury-filled season with a disappointing, injury-filled 47-24 loss Sunday to the Cardinals in Arizona.
Josh Dobbs started at quarterback after Brock Purdy’s elbow injury last week. He was 29-of-43 for 326 yards with two touchdowns, two interceptions and two fumbles (one lost).
He was also the 49ers’ second-leading rusher with 17 yards and a score on eight carries. Patrick Taylor Jr., who took over at lead back when Isaac Guerendo went down early with a leg injury, led the 49ers with 96 yards on 15 carries.
Rookie receiver Ricky Pearsall led the 49ers with 69 receiving yards and a touchdown on six catches. Jauan Jennings had seven catches for 52 yards in the first half before being ejected.
The Niners turned over the ball three times and, for the fourth straight game (all losses), did not record a takeaway.
Here’s what the Niners had to say about the loss:
Kyle Shanahan
On Jennings’ ejection:
He was competing. I know Jauan blocks to the whistle every single play and you usually get ejected for throwing a punch or something. I didn’t see one, they didn’t tell me that he threw a punch, so something we’re going to have to find out.
On his chat with Jennings after the scuffle:
I was asking him if he ever threw a punch and he was adamant that he didn’t.
On Guerendo being carted off:
Especially when you go out on a cart, you know, I think that messes with everyone a little bit but we’re still hoping out hope that it’s good news, or good news in comparison to going off on a cart and everything.
On the penalty disparity:
I haven’t been a part of too many games that’s 12-0 and I think they got one there when they had 12 guys on the field at the end. We’ll look at all of them but I didn’t see any common thread.
On Kittle not playing in the second half:
We were going to see how the game went and we knew we weren’t going to play him all of it, and ended up resting so much that we didn’t want to put him there in the second half.
On Dobbs’ game:
I thought Dobbs did a really good job, you know, minus the turnovers. Take out those turnovers and I think he had a hell of a game.
On Pearsall:
He did well this game, but I think Ricky, especially what he went through before the year, started talking before his gunshot, and then getting the gunshot, coming back and just being able to have a rookie season where he did help us out. Got a chance to play almost half the year and got better as it went.
Josh Dobbs
On his goals for the game:
Obviously get a win, but just play, you know. Go out there and execute the offense at a high level, lead the guys around me, enjoy the opportunity to start a game in the NFL.
On the key factors:
Obviously turnovers kind of killed us. Those were the difference in the game, and then third down, converting better in those situations and being table to stay on the field, to stay in a couple more drives, to get in the end zone.
On Jennings’ ejection:
Jauan being Jauan, quite frankly, and if you look back at those two plays, like their guys taking off hishelmet and Jauan gets a flag, no clue how that happens. And then the second play, Jauan is getting stomped out aon the sideline and they throw a flag on him and eject him when he’s just playing football. So it was pretty frustrating, especially knowing how much it meant for Jauan to be out there to play hard, be himself, playing in the game and then obviously get to the milestone of 1,000 yards.
On Jennings nearing the 1,000-yard mark:
I knew he had just caught two passes on that drive, right? He caught a couple passes early. I didn’t know how close we were at all but I knew he was coming up on it. and so as I said going into the week, I was excited to be out there with him, to play with Jauan a long time since college and have the opportunity to get him to that milestone because I know how much it meant to him. So for them to take it out of his hands was frustrating.
On the offense:
I thought moving the ball throughout the day was good. We wer able to execute plays at a high level. I mean, we had a ton of offense. I think we had almost 500 yards of total offense. So we were able to play extremely well especially with various guys in and out … It comes down to turnovers and at the end of the day, that’s something as I go into the offseason to focus on and improve on.
On what he wants in free agency:
I want to go to a spot where I get a chance to compete, whether it’s for the starting job or the two role, whatever it is, to beable to push the room, contribute week-in and week-out and be a guy that the team’s relying on to win on Sundays.
On his future:
The best opportunities that you have to grow and improve are to be standing out on the field in the fire and learning how to win games in the NFL. And I haven’t gotten a ton of opportunities to do that, especially being in the same offense throughout the year.
Nick Bosa
On the season ending with an ugly loss:
Kind of an embarrassment. It doesn’t feel good. It’s hard to look the guys in their faces as a leader on the team and that’s the product that we keep putting out game after game. It’s pretty embarrassing.
On how to fix it:
It’s going to take some time off, and then start from square one. We know how to play good and we know how to play bad, so we gotta figure it out.
On how to fix it:
If I had the answers it might have changed.
On his own season:
I think I’ve grown as a person. Just appreciate the time you have in this league, whether it’s a season like this or a season where we’ve had success.
Fred Warner
On the poor defense this season:
For as long as I’ve been here, I’ve always known playing dominant defense. I cant’ speak to everything else that’s gone on with the team this year, but just hasn’t been good enough. Not even close. And to be a part of that, knowing that I’m out there every game and it still isn’t good enough, it obviously is a gut punch to my own pride.
On failing to create turnovers:
We pride ourselves on taking the ball away and protecting it on offense, and that’s the key to winning games. When you’re not doing that, you don’t give yourself any type of chance of winning.
On his ankle fracture from Week 4:
Every year’s different. You guys know it was a unique situation this year but I’ always going to try my hardest to make sure I’m out there for my guys. It’s not even a question — there’s never a doubt that I’m going to be out there if I can.
On defensive coordinator Nick Sorensen:
The easy thing right now is everybody’s going to put the blame on him for how the defense has played and when you’re the guy at the helm, that’s what happens. You’re going to take the brunt of that, but it’s everybody. Everybody’s got to take a look in the mirror. I’ve got to take a look in the mirror. Everybody’s got to look to see where they could have been better.
Jauan Jennings
On his ejection:
It was like baseball: 1-2-3 strikes, you’re out.
On whether he threw a punch:
No punches. All I did was pancake the guy. Played football. Took him and layed him on his back. Tried to get up, and he wouldn’t let me get up. Next thing you know, they’re just looking at me like I’m the bad guy.
On being ejected:
I can’t give them any explanations. I’m glad we had cameras. You can be falsely accused of anything these days so I’m glad we have cameras out there. Feel good about that.
On 1k and backing down rather than risk ejection:
I knew I was in the right. I put my hope into another human being making the right choice. Humans make mistakes.
George Kittle
On not playing the whole game:
The whole game was not going to happen today. I just wanted to get some reps out there, play a little football when there’s football ahead, until coach Shanahan or coach Fleury told me to stop playing, go play a little football.
On how Eric Saubert played in his absence:
Absolutely phenomenal. I’ll be able to watch the tape, I know he had a lot of flat-backs, he had hands on a lot of safeties, put them in the ground. He did a lot of good stuff in the pass game too. He had a couple of one-on-one pass pro sets, he won all those too. He played at a high level. I was very excited to see how he played.
On whether he’ll have an end-of-year-meeting with Shanahan tomorrow:
Am I? It’s a long line sometimes.
On what is discussed in those meetings:
It’s different every single year, depending how the years go. Just check out how I did, how I think he did and then where it goes from there. I don’t really go in there with much intent unless there’s something on my mind. The thing about Kyle is you can talk to him about anything and then it kind of goes from there.
On whether there’s something he wants to talk to Shanahan about:
Is there something I should?
On the team’s rough finish:
As a 49er, being part of this organization and being a part of this team for as long as I have, I know our standard is higher than what we put on tape this year. I trust in John and Kyle and Jed to make whatever decisions they need to make to set us back on the right track. But when you play a lot of games and have a ton of turnovers and don’t force any turnovers, it’s hard to win football games, specifically if you’re not scoring 30, 40 points a game. We spotted them three today, didn’t get one. That’s losing football. We’re going to do everything we can to fix that and stop turning the ball over so much.
On how Shanahan did:
I’ll save that for our discussion.
On Bosa’s comment that he was embarrassed:
We finished 6-11. That’s not what our goals were at the beginning of the season. Our goals were to win all our football games, go to the playoffs and do what we could do there. So yeah, disappointed. I want to win football games, and when you don’t win football games, it’s very disheartening. The reasons why we’re losing is not very fun, turnovers, not converting in the red zone, not scoring points. That put a lot of pressure on us on offense to score more points and I know if you talk to Fred he’ll say they’ve got to make more turnovers, get more stops, whatever. We’ve just got to play better team football. I don’t like putting my name on it, but my name’s on it, just like everybody else in the building.
On Trent Taylor:
Any time I get to dress with him is awesome. I love Trent. He brings a lot of joy in my life and any time I get to share fhte football field with him he just puts me in a fantastic move. I was happy for him to get to dress today but the whole season he’s been very helpful for me mentally, on and off the field.
On Dobbs:
Every time Dobbs is out there, he’s going to give him his all, and I really appreciate that. You guys will get answers from him on how he thought he played but I just appreciated his grit, his toughness and his eagerness to play this week and I think that really helped us a lot.
On his future:
Kittle: I’m going to go to New York with the Juszczyks and celebrate Kristen Jusczcyk launching her brand. That’s immediate future.
On talks with the front office:
The front office can make any decisions they want to make. We’ll go from there.
On how he’s feeling physically:
Last year I was pretty beaten up, was dealing with a lot of stuff. This year I’m not. I feel fantastic. My goal for this game was to be able to talk off the field, which I was able to do, and nothing I’m going to have to take care of, which is a huge relief and makes the offseason a lot more fun.