Top 5 takeaways from 49ers Week 14 win vs. Saints
By Elvis Jerez
No. 3: Tighten up on tight ends
The 49ers have one of the best tight ends in football. George Kittle is amazing. He boasts superstar yards-after-catch metrics and he carries defenders on his neck, while others blatantly rip at his facemask and block him.
On the flip side, the Niners have a dire need to improve defending against opponents’ tight ends. As we learned last Sunday, tight ends can have a field day. After 14 weeks of the 2019 season, the Niners defense ranks 31st against the position.
New Orleans tight end Jared Cook drilled the 49ers with two — two — receptions for 64 yards and two touchdowns before exiting early in the game to a concussion.
Who knows what damage he would’ve wreaked had he stayed in the game?
Luckily for the Saints, their tight-end-of-all-trades, Taysom Hill, was frequently deployed all over the field in Cook’s absence. This dude is a monster who can do it all. The 49ers allowed him to run for 13 yards on five touches and catch one pass for 12 yards. Hill has often been used throughout the season as a quarterback, but the Niners shut that down quickly. Not staggering numbers by themselves, but those stats came on critical downs with brute force, and without prejudice.
Going into the playoffs, defensive coordinator Robert Saleh is going to have to figure out how to use his middle linebackers to impede tight ends from running all over the 49ers.