The San Francisco 49ers have gotten so close to winning the ultimate prize in the NFL in recent years. They lost in the Super Bowl to the Kansas City Chiefs three seasons ago and have played in the NFC Championship Game for two straight years.
Last year, they fell just short against the eventual champion Los Angeles Rams. This year, it was the Philadelphia Eagles that tripped them up. However, had the 49ers not lost both of their available quarterbacks, starter Brock Purdy and his backup Josh Johnson, to injuries, wide receiver Deebo Samuel believes San Francisco was the better team and would have advanced.
Samuel isn’t the only player that feels that way. Star linebacker Fred Warner shares a similar sentiment. He said he doesn’t believe the 49ers ever had a chance to really compete after Purdy got injured on the first drive of the game and Johnson didn’t last much longer.
However, Warner also provided more insight into what the team needs to do to avoid coming up short again. He revealed that he asked himself how “our defense could have been better in that game” and how he could have been “better for our team and our defense” reflecting on things with the 2023 season approaching.
“I’ll always say defense wins championships, so it’s going to start and end with us,” Warner said, via 49ersWebzone.com. “We take that on our shoulders, that responsibility, and we need to be better.”
It is hard to envision the 49ers’ defense playing any better than they did during the 2022 season. They were the No. 1 ranked defense, giving up the fewest points and least amount of yardage during the season in the NFL.
They did pick a bad time to have a bad game, as the defense was admittedly defeated knowing that they didn’t have a healthy quarterback to lead their offense. But, while the coaching staff figures out the quarterback position until Purdy is healthy, it will be up to Warner and the defense to continue playing at a high level.
There are areas the team can improve in, as Javon Hargrave is a big addition to the interior of the defensive line. You can’t finish better than first, but if the 49ers are tougher to produce against, the defense should be more than capable of carrying the load until the offense gets into a rhythm.
