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Grading the 49ers Special Teams at the Bye Week

This group is awful across the board.

Grant Cohn

Oct 27, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers kicker Anders Carlson (41) scores a field goal against the Dallas Cowboys during the fourth quarter at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-Imagn Images
Oct 27, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers kicker Anders Carlson (41) scores a field goal against the Dallas Cowboys during the fourth quarter at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-Imagn Images / Kelley L Cox-Imagn Images
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The 49ers have the week off, so let's grade them position by position based solely on what they've done this season. So far, we've graded the quarterback, the running backs, the wide receivers, the tight ends, the offensive linemen, the defensive linemen, the linebackers and the defensive backs.

POSITION: Special teams

NAMES: Jake Moody, Eric Wright, Anders Carlsen, Mitch Wishnowsky, Jacob Cowing, Isaac Guerendo, Patrick Taylor Jr.

GRADE: F

COMMENTS: This group is awful across the board. They don't do anything well. They have given up a kickoff return for a touchdown. They've fumbled a kick return. They've muffed a punt. They have given up multiple long punt returns. They have had a punt blocked. They have given up a fake punt that picked up a first down. They've had two kickers get injured. Their current kicker, Anders Carlsen, struggles to kick the ball into the end zone on kickoffs which exacerbates the 49ers' coverage issues.

The 49ers special teams issues have become so bad, it's a surpise when they don't do something that potentially loses the game for the 49ers.

Firing special teams coordinator Brian Schneider during the season probably wouldn't fix the problem, but they'll have to fire him after the season if he doesn't turn things around quickly. Do his credit, the special teams didn't do anything terrible this past Sunday against the Cowboys. Let's see if they can keep a good thing going.

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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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