Why the 49ers Still Use a Fullback

Chris Foerster explains.

SANTA CLARA -- The 49ers have a cutting-edge offense, and yet they're one of the few teams that still uses a fullback, a position that is almost extinct.

Part of the reason the 49ers use a fullback is because they have the best one in the NFL -- Kyle Juszczyk. But they also use him because he provides schematic advantages, which run game coordinator Chris Foerster explained on Thursday.

Here's a transcript, courtesy of the 49ers P.R. department.

FOERSTER : "Everybody wants to take the game and become a spread. That's been the trend over time. So then you can stay with the I formation and do the things, but being able to break out of the I and use your fullback in those other ways allows you to kind of do some of the spread things, some of the things that other teams are doing without a fullback, and yet still put the fullback in the backfield and put you in a position that you can run some of the traditional plays that you'd use a traditional fullback on. There's a lot of advantages to having a fullback. So put them in the backfield there and being able to do the things we do with him or the other tight ends, there's an advantage to how you can cut the defense, different things you can do. When you're a one back offense, you don't have a lot of leverage and things like that. That's why the quarterback runs. The zone read stuff becomes such a big thing because you regain an advantage that you don't have with one back in the backfield. So, that advantage that Kyle gives us and that it lets you do a little bit of everything, that's really cool. I've talked to the guys in Miami, the guy they have there in [Miami Dolphins FB Alec] Ingold, he has a heck of a job doing some of the same things. He's probably not quite as versatile athletically, but he still does a lot of those same things. Then it's still a good fullback.”

Q: Is there a tipping point of when that position had to evolve in a way because it used to just be like the sledgehammers going through?

FOERSTER: "Well, I think what happened was, I ran into it when I was in Tampa. There was a really good guy, in fact, with [former Tennessee Titans TE] Frank Wycheck’s passing, the Music City Miracle. One of the pieces of that was [former NFL FB] Lorenzo Neal, and Lorenzo was with us in Tampa, and Lorenzo was the definition of leverage. You say how do you get leverage? Well, you'd be about 5’9 and weigh about 240 pounds and be built like a fire hydrant. You have leverage on everybody you're going to block. Well, Zo was that, but the problem was that even in Tampa where we weren't going to throw the ball a lot back in the day, he played 15 snaps, you're paying him x amount of dollars to play that limited number of snaps. And so, all of a sudden, you're like, it's not worth it. Then you wanted to throw the ball a little bit more, do different things with different positions. So I think that if you're going to be on the roster, you can't have somebody that's that limited. So having that be more versatile it fits the salary cap, everything that goes into it.”

ME: Can you also execute more blocking combinations with the fullback on the field?

FOERSTER: There’s more things available. There really are. There's just more. Moving tight ends, it's all the same thing that halfback type position, but you're having guys that can just can cut the defense in different ways. Things that you see sometimes we have these plays that you just see, it just kind of opens up because we've cut it, we build a wall this way, we knock things out this way. But that allows with fullback. When it's one back, you're always in. We've had one our most productive plays, the one back play. The fullback might be up on the line of scrimmage, but we don't have the cut of the defense. We don't have angles on. It's been a productive play for us. This season, more productive than ever and it's still probably our best play. But those plays do, all of a sudden you're doing this, bam, you cut the defense with the fullback and it gives you some more flexibility.”