Predicting the final 4 games of the 49ers' 2023 season
With a month to go in the season and the 49ers on a win streak, Niner Noise takes a look at how the season will end for the surging Niners.
It was a good weekend for the San Francisco 49ers, as they won their fifth straight game (for the second time this season) by defeating the Seattle Seahawks 28-16 on Sunday and then clinched the NFL's first playoff berth by way of the Green Bay Packers falling to the New York Giants on Monday Night Football.
There's still work to do to wrap up another NFC West title, but the 49ers are in good shape to ensure that the lowest seed they can earn heading into NFC playoffs is number three, although they currently hold the top seed – and all the all-important first-round bye – heading into Week 15.
With four games left to go before the season's end, the 49ers appear to have reheated up at the right time, and while there are some tough tests left on the schedule, there's no reason to believe that the Niners can't storm into the playoffs in the same way they did last season: riding a massive win streak.
The 49ers' offense is among the best in the league, not only in terms of raw output (third in scoring, second in yards, etc), but more in-depth analytics such as DVoA have them ranked at or near the top of the NFL in most categories (first overall, first on offense, and fourth on defense).
And ever more advanced data such as EPA per play have the 49ers comfortably as the NFL's top team, top offense (by a rather wide margin), and sixth-best defense.
All that to say, the 2023 49ers are an excellent team and pinning a "Super Bowl or bust" moniker on them is more than rationale.
Keeping all that in mind, though, let's take a look at how the final four games of the regular season stack up and how the outcomes of those games could turn out.