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		Niners prepare for Seahawks this Sunday By David Zizmor September 26, 2007

	Last week on Sportstalk, I said the Niners would be holding back some of their offense because they felt Pittsburgh might be the first really competitive team the Niners were going to face on the schedule, but some how that was really doubtful that was the case. The Steelers were responding to some of the criticism that the team received in the local media because they would go backwards on Arizona and because the Niners had trouble with Arizona the last couple of years. Also I find it difficult to believe that the Niners would hold back on the St. Louis Rams for the same reasons who are the Niners division opponents because its really tough and try to hold some back. At the same time the Niners were running plays up against the Steelers last Sunday which we hadn't seen on offense and that have not been run this season. Especially those designed plays that Alex Smith ran who rolled to his right and to his left and spot receivers running in that general direction and we hadn't seen that this year. It's been much more vanilla in the first couple of games and the Niners opened up the offense a little bit and it wasn't as successful as they would have liked. I think part of the problem is the offensive line is not quite as dominant as it was last year. We saw the Niners get blown out cold and Frank Gore had to pound his way through the line and he had tons of room to run whose usually bouncing off a linebacker and some cornerbacks which is great which means your getting past the first wave of the defense. Thats why Gore led the league with over 1600 yards rushing last year and he doesn't have that this year so far and we haven't seen the Niners powering anyone of the block and we haven't seen any big runs outside of that one 43 yards against the Rams. So until the 49ers can get that consistent running game going its going to be a bit tough and the other half of the problem is that everybody including Gore is the focal point of their offense now and the Niners are trying to move everyone up closer to the line. Which would leave the Niners much less even and their not putting eight yards in the box, the Niners are bringing the safeties up much closer to the line. The linebackers are much closer to the line and there is not much time to maneuver theoretically, this should be leaving more room for them in the passing game down field but the problem is when the Niners go back to pass the guys aren't getting open or the certain linemen are not protecting certain areas so that Smith could find them open down field. I have a hunch as the 49ers look at more tape and maybe when the Niners get past the by-week, once thats done they can begin to review tapes of previous games and start looking forward, maybe the coaches will start to see what the tendencies are against them and really let it fly at that point. Right now the one thing were seeing is that teams are focusing on Frank Gore because they feel like Smith can't beat them down field and thats been the case so far. Fortunate for the 49ers they have been able to stay in those brief games the defense has been playing much better as were seeing Nate Clemens living up to that huge contract that he signed he's shutting down whoever he's covering for the most part and the rest of the defense is doing a good job. The defense is getting fairly consistent pressure on the quarterback. The Niners should be getting a few more sacks and thats what you'd like to see. If anything the Niners might be a bit disappointed with the run defense and this is partly due to a three-four defense, the guys on the defensive line are just not as big as they would like them to be thats to be expected and they just haven't had a chance to develop the down lines and they can meet them in the 3-4 system and Bryant Young is fantastic but Franklin and Marcus Douglas are exactly classic 3-4 guys. The 49ers prepare for Seattle at Candlestick Park this Sunday a 1:00PM kick off. David Zizmor co-hosts Sportstalk on 1690 KFSG and covers Niners football.