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Jay Gruden Isn't a Fan of 49ers HC Kyle Shanahan's Pass Concepts

Keep in mind, Gruden and Shanahan were offensive assistants together on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2004 and 2005.

Grant Cohn

Nov 8, 2020; Jacksonville, Florida, USA; Jacksonville Jaguars offensive coordinator Jay Gruden watches from the sidelines during the second quarter against the Houston Texans at TIAA Bank Field. Mandatory Credit: Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images
Nov 8, 2020; Jacksonville, Florida, USA; Jacksonville Jaguars offensive coordinator Jay Gruden watches from the sidelines during the second quarter against the Houston Texans at TIAA Bank Field. Mandatory Credit: Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images / Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images
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Kyle Shanahan got exposed this past weekend.

He trailed against the Minnesota Vikings this past weekend and couldn't come from behind to win. He stopped calling play-action passes and instead called mostly drop-back passes, and as a result, Brock Purdy got sacked six times and the 49ers offense scored just 17 points.

Former head coach Jay Gruden was not impressed.

"I'm just not a big fan of his true pass concepts when he's down," Gruden said recently on the 3 and Out Podcast with John Middlekauf. "I just don't understand a lot of them. That's something you have to continue to work on in OTAs, training camp and all that stuff. You have to prepare to be down. It's a lot easier to call plays when you're ahead by 14 points on first and second down. Not many coaches have had a lot of success calling plays (when they're) down and having to come back. It's very difficult when you're a one-dimensional team. I'm not saying I had a lot of success (in those situations). From a pass-game standpoint, when I study teams, that would be one of the last teams I would look at as far as pass concepts go in known passing situations. I'd look elsewhere."

Keep in mind, Gruden and Shanahan were offensive assistants together on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2004 and 2005. So they know each other quite well. Maybe there's a personal beef between the two.

But even if there is a beef, Gruden is right about Shanahan. If you can take away his running game and play-action passing game and turn him into a one-dimensional drop-back passing offense as the Chiefs did to him in the Super Bowl, he'll lose.

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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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