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49ers HC Kyle Shanahan Says the "Wind was Weird" for Jake Moody's Misses

Kyle Shanahan still won't accept that the 49ers need a new kicker.

Grant Cohn

Nov 10, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; San Francisco 49ers place kicker Jake Moody (4) makes a field goal against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during the second half at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images
Nov 10, 2024; Tampa, Florida, USA; San Francisco 49ers place kicker Jake Moody (4) makes a field goal against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers during the second half at Raymond James Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images / Kim Klement Neitzel-Imagn Images
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Kyle Shanahan still won't accept that the 49ers need a new kicker.

Jake Moody has been a giant disappointment. Last year's third-round pick missed three kicks in the playoffs and three field goals Sunday in the 49ers' 23-20 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. To be fair, he also made three field goals including the game-winner. Still, three for six is terrible for a professional kicker.

It's time for the 49ers to cut bait and find a better kicker. And yet, Shanahan still makes excuses for Moody.

"I thought it wasn't the easiest place to kick in," Shanahan said on Monday. "The wind was weird, especially the direction that he missed the stuff. It was different. But it was a few big kicks and came back and hit his first game winner on a walk off. So, thought he finished it well and we'll move on to next week with it.”

As if the game was a positive learning experience for Moody. Please. If Moody misses another field goal next week, the 49ers will have no choice but to cut him and sign someone else.

Moody's problem is that the 49ers put too much pressure on him by drafting him in the third round. He can't handle the expectations. Maybe he would perform better on a team that didn't draft him in Round 3.

Perhaps the 49ers can sign Matthew Wright, the kicker they brought in initially to replace Moody when he suffered a high-ankle sprain.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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