By Morris Phillips
The 49ers’ game plan for beating the six-win Falcons was probably more nuanced, but the short version appeared to go something like this:
No. 47, you shut down Pro Bowl-caliber receiver Julio Jones and No. 24 you outdo NFL rushing leader, Devonta Freeman. And by the way, No. 24, you’re our new starting running back.
Talk about an effective plan: the 49ers came up with the 17-16 victory, their first over a team with a winning record, after losing six of their last seven games.
Shaun Draughn, No. 24, was sitting on the couch with his wife, one-year old son and four-year old daughter when he received a phone call from the 49ers that prompted him to catch the first thing smoking to the Bay Area. Seven days later, Draughn, who was released by Cleveland after spending the first six games of this season with the Browns, had an inkling that he was about to get good news, but he sure didn’t know how or when he would get that news.
So how did the 27-year old Draughn find out he was starting in place of the injured Carlos Hyde?
“When Tom (Rathman) walked up to me on the sideline before the game and said I was starting,” Draughn said.
Desperate times call for desperate measures and the 2-6 49ers certainly qualified heading into their home game with the Falcons. The team was riddled with injuries, especially in their offensive backfield and secondary, and they had effectively parted ways with their “franchise” quarterback in Colin Kaepernick by announcing that he would be benched in favor of Blaine Gabbert.
So in stepped Draughn, a free agent who, according to him, has been cut by eight different teams in his brief, nomadic NFL career. Marcus Cromartie, No. 47, was briefly a member of the San Francisco practice squad before he was promoted to the game-day roster this week. Cromartie’s dramatic ascension came so fast that his name doesn’t even appear on the team’s roster on the gameday flipcard.
But with little notoriety—and in addition to a pair of curious, late game decisions made by Falcons’ head coach Dan Quinn–Draughn and Cromartie made big contributions that were integral to the outcome of the game.
Draughn contributed 92 yards in offense from scrimmage, running and catching, and Cromartie matched up with Jones frequently on a day that the powerful receiver was kept out of the end zone and his team scored just 16 points.
Gabbert didn’t empty the playbook with his 15 for 25 passing performance, but he threw a pair of touchdown passes to Brent Celek in the second quarter and used his legs—ala Kaepernick—in the second half to help make a 17-point offensive output somehow stand up for an improbable victory.
“It wasn’t pretty at times, but our defense played well,” Gabbert said. “Got a big stop for us at the end and we found a way to move the chains there at the end to kill the clock.”
Quinn’s controversial decision may have been the key component to an unlikely outcome. With the Falcons facing 4th-and-goal at the 1 with three minutes remaining in the game, Quinn decided to forgo a shot at a touchdown that would have given them the lead, instead opting for a 19-yard Matt Bryant field goal that drew them within a point of the lead.
Quinn’s rationale? The former Seattle defensive coordinator decided to put faith in his defense, hoping they could force a three-and-out that would give his offense the ball with enough time to drive a short field for a game-winning field goal. Afterwards, in explaining, Quinn pointed out that his offense had been exceptional with little time on the clock, as they were in the first half, needing just three plays to cut into the 49ers 17-6 lead with a 17-yard touchdown pass to Freeman.
But Quinn, upon the prompting of his coaches and television spotters upstairs, had squandered one of the Falcons three time outs challenging a spot that gave the 49ers a first down midway through the fourth quarter. What prompted the Atlanta brain trust to question the spot wasn’t clear: television replays didn’t offer an angle that would have given conclusive evidence to justify overturning the call. In fact, without a replay angle from a Skycam above the players, it would be difficult for a team to justify a challenge based on traditional camera angles that offer little more than a pile of bodies on a fourth-and-short play rather than a conclusive look at the football.
Given a chance to close the game out, the 49ers did, running Kendall Gaskins four times and Gabbert once on a nifty, five-yard scramble. Gaskins, another new 49ers’ face, contributed a big eight-yard run and the 49ers picked up not one, but two first downs to finish the game, leaving the Falcons’ offense on the sideline.
Defensively, the 49ers surprised by shutting down Freeman, who entered with 709 yards rushing to lead the entire NFL. Cromartie sent an early message by dropping Freeman for a four-yard loss in the first quarter. On the day, the Falcons rushed for just 17 yards on 14 attempts, considerably lower than the 111 yards rushing the 49ers had allowed on average in their first eight games.
After the game, Falcons’ offensive lineman Ryan Schrader acknowledged that the 49ers’ frequent blitzes—often with NaVorro Bowman shooting between the guard and center—disrupted the timing of the Atlanta offense. The Falcons one-dimensional attack did little outside of Matt Ryan’s 303 passing yards.
The 49ers have a much-needed bye week to get reorganized before they travel to Seattle to face the Seahawks on November 22.
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