Coaching Matters: 2021 San Francisco 49ers Coaching Staff Preview

August 1, 2021

Eli Grabanski previews the 2021 San Francisco 49ers' coaching staff in search of buy-lows, fantasy football sleepers, and risers based on play-calling and historical data.

After every NFL season, NFL teams take the time to evaluate not only the players but also the coaching staff and front office as well. While many teams choose to retain the same head coach, offensive coordinator, and defensive coordinator, a few other teams opt to go in a new direction with their coaching staff.

Outside of defensive coordinator Robert Saleh leaving to become the newest coach of the New York Jets, the San Francisco 49ers will be bringing back many of their key coaching staff members from the 2020 season. Kyle Shanahan will return as the 49ers head coach. Mike McDaniel will be the team's offensive coordinator in 2021 after the position was left vacant in 2020. DeMeco Ryans will be the team's new defensive coordinator, replacing Robert Saleh.

This article will look at the potential impact this coaching staff will have on the players and try to pinpoint the 49ers players' fantasy values in it.

The Baseline

To get a better understanding of the value the 49ers coaches help bring to this team, we can look at the NFL league averages in each of the past two years in a variety of statistical categories and then compare them to the averages achieved by the 49ers' coaches. Here are 'The Baseline' NFL league averages over the past couple of years:

QB Impact

RB Impact

WR Impact

TE Impact

Defense Impact

Previous Coaching Staff

In order to get an understanding of how the San Francisco 49ers' fantasy players may be impacted this year, we also need to look at a key member of the San Francisco 49ers' previous coaching staff: Robert Saleh. By doing this, we will have a better understanding of where the new regime is starting from and where the primary changes will occur.

Former Defensive Coordinator: Robert Saleh

2021 Offense

2021 Head Coach: Kyle Shanahan

Kyle Shanahan has been the San Francisco 49ers head coach since 2017. In addition, he has previously served as an offensive coordinator for the Houston Texans (2008-2009), Washington Redskins (2010-2013), Cleveland Browns (2014), and Atlanta Falcons (2015-2016). Given his offensive background, let's take a look at some of his team's offensive statistics over the course of his 208 game career as either an offensive coordinator or head coach.

QB Impact

RB Impact

WR Impact

TE Impact

2021 Offensive Coordinator: Mike McDaniel

Kyle Shanahan And Mike McDaniel Takeaways & Expectations

Kyle Shanahan is going to be the primary play-caller of the San Francisco 49ers and Mike McDaniel has never officially worked as an offensive coordinator or head coach before, so we will primarily be talking about the offense that Kyle Shanahan has liked to run over the course of his career in this section. Over the course of Kyle Shanahan's 208 game career as an offensive play-caller, his offenses have averaged 34.83 passing attempts per game - which is around league average.

In addition, it's also important to pay attention to the amount of rushing work a quarterback receives since it can give your quarterback a higher ceiling in your fantasy leagues. Over the course of his career, Shanahan's quarterback room has averaged 3.11 carries per game.

This career average in quarterback carries per game is nothing special, but it is important to note that he was willing to adapt based on his quarterback's abilities as seen in the graph above. If Jimmy Garoppolo is the starter, there won't be a lot of rushing work going to the quarterback position. But as soon as Trey Lance becomes the starter under Shanahan, you can expect the rushing work to explode at the position and look more like the levels in 2012 and 2013 where Robert Griffin III was his starting quarterback. Overall, Jimmy Garoppolo will be in the streaming mix for fantasy leagues as long as he's the starter and Trey Lance will have low-end QB1/high-end QB2 potential due to his rushing upside - if he can overtake Jimmy Garoppolo on the depth chart.

Looking at the running back position, Kyle Shanahan does a pretty good job of giving his running backs work. Over the course of the 208 games that Kyle Shanahan has been an offensive coordinator or head coach, his running back room has averaged 23.13 carries and 0.78 rushing touchdowns per game - both of which are above-average for a play-caller.

This level of usage is extremely encouraging for the 49ers running backs' fantasy outlooks. But overall, what percentage of the carries go to one running back versus Shanahan conducting a running back by committee approach?

Shanahan has been one of the more unpredictable play-callers in the rushing attack he wants to deploy with his backs, with him giving greater than 50% of his team's season running back carries to his lead back in seven of his thirteen seasons. Over the last three seasons, he's leaned more towards the 'hot hand' approach with his lead back on the season seeing under 50% of the carries in each season. Given the 49ers' personnel, it's likely that they split carries between Raheem Mostert, Trey Sermon, Wayne Gallman Jr., and Jeff Wilson in 2021. But if the 'hot hand' stays hot, Shanahan will be sure to reward them with carries.

The last aspect we should look at concerning Kyle Shanahan's running backs is how much he has traditionally utilized them as pass-catchers. Over the course of his 208 game career as an offensive coordinator or head coach, Shanahan's running back room has averaged 5.50 targets per game.

This usage is slightly below average compared to what other play-callers provide their running backs through the air. Overall, Kyle Shanahan will provide his running backs with a healthy amount of carries and will give his running backs a below-average amount of targets. Based on this information, the San Francisco 49ers are certainly capable of producing an RB2 - but it will ultimately come down to if one running back can hold onto that lead role for most of the season.

Looking at the wide receiver position, Shanahan has provided his wide receivers with 19.75 targets per game over the course of his 208 game career as an offensive coordinator or head coach.

This career average is about what we'd expect from the typical play-caller, but it is important to note that Shanahan has utilized the position less in recent years with the 49ers' wide receivers getting 14.56 targets per game in 2019 and 17.5 targets per game in 2020. Under Shanahan, the 49ers' offense is likely to only going to produce one, maybe two fantasy-relevant wide receivers during the 2021 season.

Finally, we need to dive into Shanahan's usage of tight ends. Over the course of his career as an offensive play-caller, Shanahan's tight end room has averaged 7.61 targets per game.

Shanahan has been pretty reliable in feeding his tight ends over the course of his career - in particular over the last three seasons he's been the 49ers head coach. Based on this George Kittle should be a top-tier fantasy tight end once again, and be one of the first three tight ends off the board in your fantasy draft.

Fantasy Relevant Players: Jimmy Garoppolo, Trey Lance, Raheem Mostert, Jeff Wilson Jr., Trey Sermon, Wayne Gallman Jr., Deebo Samuel, Brandon Aiyuk, Richie James Jr., Jalen Hurd, Mohamed Sanu, Trent Sherfield, Travis Benjamin, Kyle Juszczyk, Ross Dwelley, and George Kittle

2021 Defense

2021 Defensive Coordinator: DeMeco Ryans

DeMeco Ryans will be the San Francisco 49ers' defensive coordinator in 2021 after former defensive coordinator Robert Saleh was hired by the New York Jets to be their new head coach. Ryans has been with the San Francisco 49ers since 2017, spending time as a defensive quality control coach (2017) and inside linebackers coach (2018-2020) for the team.

It's more difficult to project what kind of production we will see from the San Francisco 49ers defense because this is DeMeco's first year ever serving as a defensive coordinator. But we do know a couple of things. First, the San Francisco 49ers defense has been above average in the last few years, so the talent is clearly there to field a great defense. Second, Ryans had worked under Robert Saleh for his entire coaching career thus far, so he should have a pretty good understanding of what has made the defense successful in recent years. Overall, there is some uncertainty with the San Francisco D/ST under DeMeco Ryans. But for now, while they likely won't be as good as they were under Saleh (since he was a top tier defensive coordinator), we can project that the San Francisco 49ers D/ST will be slightly above-average once again in 2021 based on the talent they have when everyone is healthy and the belief that Ryans will continue to utilize a lot of the same ideas and concepts that Robert Saleh did.

Other Notable Assistants

Special Teams Coordinator: Richard Hightower - Richard Hightower has been the San Francisco 49ers special teams coordinator since 2017. He's been coaching since 2006, previously spending time in the NFL with the Houston Texans (2006-2008), Washington Redskins (2010-2013), Cleveland Browns (2014), San Francisco 49ers (2015), and Chicago Bears (2016) before taking the 49ers special teams coordinator job.

QB Coach: Rich Scangarello - Rich Scangarello will be making his return as the San Francisco 49ers quarterbacks coach in 2021, after serving in the same role in the 2017 and 2018 seasons. He's been coaching since 1998 and has also previously served as an offensive coordinator of the Denver Broncos (2019).

RB Coach: Robert Turner Jr. - Robert Turner Jr. has been the San Francisco 49ers running backs coach since 2017. He's been coaching football since 1972 and has previously spent time coaching running backs at the NFL level for the Denver Broncos (1995-2009), Washington Redskins (2010-2013), and Atlanta Falcons (2015-2016).

WR Coach: Wes Welker - Wes Welker has been the San Francisco 49ers wide receivers coach since 2019. Prior to joining the San Francisco 49ers coaching staff, he spent two years as an offensive assistant & special teams assistant for the Houston Texans (2017-2018). In addition, Welker played wide receiver at the NFL level for the San Diego Chargers (2004), Miami Dolphins (2004-2006), New England Patriots (2007-2012), Denver Broncos (2013-2014), and St. Louis Rams (2015).

TE Coach: Jon Embree - Jon Embree has served as the San Francisco 49ers tight ends coach since 2017. He's been coaching since 1991, spending time coaching tight ends at the NFL level for the Kansas City Chiefs (2006-2008), Washington Redskins (2010), Cleveland Browns (2013), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2014-2016). He also serves as the team's assistant head coach.

OL Coach: Chris Foerster - Chris Foerster rejoined the San Francisco 49ers in 2019 after two prior stints with the team, but 2021 will be his first year as an offensive line coach on Kyle Shanahan's staff. Foerster has been coaching since 1982, and previously spent time coaching offensive lines at the NFL level for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (1996-2001), Baltimore Ravens (2005-2007), San Francisco 49ers (2008-2009, 2015), Washington Redskins (2010-2014), and Miami Dolphins (2016-2017). He also notably resigned from the Dolphins in October of 2017 after a video surfaced of him snorting a white powder.

DL Coach: Kris Kocurek - Kris Kocurek has been the San Francisco 49ers' defensive line since 2019. He's been coaching since 2003 and has also notably spent time as an NFL defensive line coach for the Detroit Lions (2010-2017) and Miami Dolphins (2018).

LB Coach: Johnny Holland - Johnny Holland has been with the San Francisco 49ers since 2017. He's served as a linebackers coach at the NFL level for the Green Bay Packers (1999), Seattle Seahawks (2001-2002), Detroit Lions (2005), Houston Texans (2006-2010), Oakland Raiders (2012), and San Francisco 49ers (2017, Present). He also played linebacker in the NFL for the Green Bay Packers (1987-1993).

Secondary Coach: Cory Undlin - Cory Undlin is new to the San Francisco 49ers coaching staff in 2021 after spending the 2020 season as the Detroit Lions defensive coordinator. Undlin has been coaching since 1998, notably spending time as a defensive backs coach of the Cleveland Browns (2008), Jacksonville Jaguars (2010-2011), Denver Broncos (2013-2014), and the Philadelphia Eagles (2015-2019).

Safeties Coach: Daniel Bullocks - Daniel Bullocks has been with the San Francisco 49ers since 2017 and served as the team's safeties coach since 2019. He's been coaching football since 2012 and also played safety in the NFL for the Detroit Lions (2006-2009)

Enjoy this series? Be sure to check out all of the other 'Coaching Matters' team previews!

AFC South: Houston Texans, Jacksonville Jaguars, Indianapolis Colts, Tennessee Titans

AFC North: Cleveland Browns, Baltimore Ravens, Pittsburgh Steelers, Cincinnati Bengals

AFC West: Las Vegas Raiders, Los Angeles Chargers, Kansas City Chiefs, Denver Broncos

AFC East: New England Patriots, Miami Dolphins, New York Jets, Buffalo Bills

NFC South: Carolina Panthers, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, New Orleans Saints, Atlanta Falcons

NFC North: Green Bay Packers, Detroit Lions, Chicago Bears, Minnesota Vikings

NFC West: Arizona Cardinals, Seattle Seahawks, and Los Angeles Rams

Follow Eli Grabanski on Twitter: @3li_handles

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