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		Niners offense still a question By David Zizmor November 10, 2007

	At this point it's really hard to allocate the blame as we can look at what 49ers offensive coordinator Jim Hostler is doing and saying, he's not putting out an aggressive game plan by any means and he couldn't have been more aggressive as the season progresses largely because the 49ers fan base has been clamoring for it. The Niners opened up the season with two wins and the Niners were ultra conservative in those two games and the Niners were running the ball for three yards in a cloud of dust every time and the Niners are now throwing the ball the rest of the time. You have to put some of the blame on Coach Nolan, for the most part because he's the head coach and it all really comes down to him. I think we could look at this team and say maybe they weren't as good as we thought they were, and maybe the talent wasn't quite there and they need a little bit more time to get things more together. As Mike Nolan had been saying they were on a four year plan not a three year plan and in 2008 the year they expected to be competitive they expected to be competitive at the end of last year and they finished 7-9 and when they had wins in Seattle and Denver they got their expectations up. But going into this season its hard to say the Niners are really a good team and when you look at this team they had so much confidence with Turner as coordinator last season they truly don't have the confidence with Hostler running the show. Nolan is the one who ultimately has the say on how this team is run and if this team is running on a conservative offense or a bad offense you have to look at Nolan and Hostler second. Part of the problem Alex Smith has been injured it certainly hasn't helped Trent Dilfer playing the back up quarterback role the defense hasn't performed that badly they're on the field so much and they're under so much pressure because the offense is so bad that ultimately they're going to break. The Niners are giving up in the neighborhood 20 points a game in the last few weeks that should be enough for a half decent offense and the Niners don't have a half decent offense they have a crappy offense and with a crappy offense a decent defense isn't going to cut it. Nolan has to let everything air out. He's got to put everything out on the field, and play as aggressive as he can because at this point the Niners are really playing for the playoffs they're playing for respect and they're playing to make sure that New England doesn't get a top five pick, remember the Niners traded they're number one pick to the Patriots. No one wants to see the Patriots getting the number four pick in the draft given how they're playing right now. So there is some talent on the Niners and we've seen Vernon Davis, and we know guys like Darrell Jackson are decent players and we know that Frank Gore is a good running back, but we have to see Smith progress and prove that he can be a quarterback in this league because in his third year even as quarterback in the league he's got to show some flashes in the season as the season, winds down for the 49ers to justify all this money they dumped into him. The Niners are really going to have to look really hard at getting a decent back up for Smith in the off season and if Smith wants to avoid that kind of pressure in training camp he's got to start performing right now and Smith has it in him but he's got to stop playing tentatively and he's got to play aggressiveness and some assertion. Smith has to make himself a leader on that field or he's going to wash out by the time he's a sixth year player. So the Niners have a ways to go and Nolan is shouldering much of the blame here but the 49ers have eight games to prove us wrong. David Zizmor covers 49ers football with Tony the Tiger Hayes and Pearl Lo catch them all on Sportstalk on 1690 KFSG Sacramento.