This season has not been very kind to the San Francisco 49ers thus far. Or rather, the Niners have not been very kind to themselves.
Through five games, last season's NFC champions find themselves at 2-3. While the 49ers had a tough battle against a very good Minnesota Vikings team, their other two losses came against lesser teams in which they had late leads and couldn't close the games out.
At this point, the toughest part about the Niners being 2-3 is the fact they are 0-2 against their division and 0-3 against the NFC.
They have a short turnaround here before they play another divisional opponent, the Seattle Seahawks on Thursday Night Football. The 49ers will have to fix some of their glaring issues that have come up repeatedly in their past three losses.
Here are three glaring issues, that if fixed, should help San Francisco defeat Seattle on Thursday.
No. 3: Turnovers
It's no surprise the 49ers have lost games in which they also lost the turnover battle. In their three losses, they are minus-3 in turnover differential.
If the Niners want to turn this season around, and more specifically beat the Seahawks, they will have to protect the ball consistently.
Quarterback Brock Purdy threw two interceptions against the Arizona Cardinals, which were tipped at the line and were gifted to defenders with all the hangtime.
Although Purdy didn't necessarily throw bad balls into double coverage or anything of that nature, he'll need to do a better job of making sure he doesn't let balls go that have the potential of getting tipped when in the pocket.
Running back Jordan Mason has only lost one fumble this season. Unfortunately, it was also against the Cardinals, and it gifted them their game-winning drive.
Mason will have do an extra good job of holding onto the ball against the Hawks on Thursday, if the 49ers want to come out on top.
No. 2: Scoring consistently
In their losses, the Niners seemed to have trouble scoring consistently throughout those games.
In their two wins this season, they have scored in every quarter. Inversely, in their three losses, they failed to score in at least one quarter of all those games.
Against Minnesota, San Francisco's offense was shutout in the first and third quarters. Against Arizona, it was even more serious in that the offense was shut out of the whole second half.
The 49ers have had some great offensive drives, with some highlight reel-worthy plays. However, they need to score consistently throughout the game against Seattle to ensure no late-game comebacks happen against them again.
No. 1: Red-zone efficiency
The 49ers' red-zone efficiency is another area that has been blatantly bad this season. Entering Week 6, the Niners are 30th out of 32 teams in the NFL right now in scoring touchdowns in this area of the field.
For a team coming off of a conference championship, that is extremely bad. A big part of the reason for that stat is likely the absence of dual-threat running back Christian McCaffrey due to injury.
However, the 49ers have enough talent at their skill positions to not be in this situation. The Niners will have to find some creative ways to get players like pass catchers Brandon Aiyuk, George Kittle and Deebo Samuel Sr. involved consistently in the red zone.
The Niners have a short week to get things right before they head to Seattle for Thursday's primetime bout, and they'll need to address those aforementioned issues if they want to defeat the Seahawks and get their season back on track.