{"id":508160,"date":"2026-10-26T06:24:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-26T06:24:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/508160\/"},"modified":"2026-10-26T06:24:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-26T06:24:16","slug":"3-winners-and-11-losers-from-the-49ers-loss-to-the-falcons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/508160\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Winners and 11 Losers from the 49ers\u2019 loss to the Falcons"},"content":{"rendered":"

The San Francisco 49ers dropped their first game of the season<\/a> against the Atlanta Falcons in Week 7.<\/p>\n

The 49ers outgained the Falcons by 105 yards and by 1.5 yards per play. But seven penalties, four of which turned into first downs for the Falcons, plus four turnovers and a missed extra point, are how you lose that game.<\/p>\n

When you\u2019re already down your most impactful player on both sides of the ball, you can\u2019t expect to beat anyone, let alone on the road in a short week.<\/p>\n

You can be frustrated with the performance and understand the sky isn\u2019t falling. The 49ers are 6-1 and remain one of, if not the best, teams in the NFL. Sunday just wasn\u2019t their day.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a look at the winners and losers from Week 7.<\/p>\n

Warner finished with two tackles for loss and a couple of big stops that helped get the defense off the field. He finished with a team-high 13 tackles. Warner wasn\u2019t targeted once. He only rushed the passer twice. That suggests Warner took away the middle of the field in coverage. Penix had two attempts over the middle of the field beyond 10 yards. Warner did his job.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s playing the run as well as he has in his career.<\/p>\n

The end-of-game fumble summed up the turnover battle. Don\u2019t let that play cloud your judgment about how Kittle played.<\/p>\n

Kittle caught eight of his 10 receptions for 88 yards, and averaged five yards after the catch. He also caught both third-down targets for 21 yards. We knew Kittle would be heavily involved in the passing game. He was targeted at the fourth-highest rate among all tight ends in Week 7.<\/p>\n

Sumer Sports had Kittle with a team-high five impact plays. He proved that the 49ers offense could function without Mike Evans.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the three best players to start here, but that\u2019s how it should be when your depth is depleted. You should lean on your best players, and that\u2019s what the 49ers did.<\/p>\n

McCaffrey finished the game with only seven carries, but that\u2019s because of an injury and the 49ers having the ball only once in the third quarter.<\/p>\n

McCaffrey posted an incredible 71.4% success rate, gaining 25 yards after contact. He was the 49ers\u2019 offensive weapon on their first drive of the game. McCaffrey finished with six receptions on seven targets for 61 yards. McCaffrey caught a contested target, and he also sprawled out along the sideline to reel one in.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t watch Week 7 thinking, \u201cPurdy cost the 49ers the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was an objectively bad decision on an interception that should\u2019ve ended up in the 10th row. If you\u2019ve ever played quarterback, it\u2019s one you\u2019ve probably thrown because you thought you had more space along the sideline than you actually did \u2014 and probably because you waited too long to decide who to throw the ball to.<\/p>\n

Purdy had dropback on the drive before where he scrambled, and it felt like he was in the pocket for 10 seconds. He bought enough time for his tight end and picked up a first down on what would\u2019ve been third and long.<\/p>\n

On another play, Colton McKivitz was beaten cleanly off the line of scrimmage, which would result in a sack for 90% of quarterbacks. Purdy danced around the pocket just long enough before shoveling the ball to Jordan James, who ran for a first down\u2014another second-and-long turned into a first down.<\/p>\n

The second interception is one you tip your cap to the Atlanta Falcons on a design that has gotten the best of Purdy throughout the years.<\/p>\n

Purdy finished in the top five this week among quarterbacks in success rate. His throws to Jordan Watkins, especially the one in the end zone, were on the money\u2014the end-zone one is about as good a throw as you can make.<\/p>\n

He made a few different throws that were contested that his pass catchers did not haul in. They are the same throws we\u2019ve taken for granted because Evans has caught them all year.<\/p>\n

Purdy was a big reason the 49ers were competitive on Sunday.<\/p>\n

After everything that went wrong, the 49ers could\u2019ve had the ball with an opportunity to tie the game. But another Pineiro missed extra point put the 49ers in a predicament.<\/p>\n

The 49ers have been asking for it for multiple games with these misses. Pineiro\u2019s only game without a missed kick was Week 2 against Miami. It nearly cost the team in Week 3. The next two games were closer because of Pineiro\u2019s misses. In this one, the Niners couldn\u2019t make up for another mistake by the kicker.<\/p>\n

The defensive line ate some humble pie heading into the bye week. Michael Penix was pressured on 14.3% of his dropbacks, a Week 7 league low.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve grown accustomed to every player winning their 1-on-1 battles at least once or twice a game. That was not the case against Atlanta.<\/p>\n

This game should be a wake-up call for the 49ers that Osa Odighizuwa cannot be the defensive tackle who plays the most snaps for you.<\/p>\n

You won\u2019t confuse him for a run defender, but the 49ers cannot afford a goose egg from Odighizuwa. He had a 0.0% pass-rush win rate, the same as Sebastian Valdez. Odighizuwa compounded his lack of impact with an unforgivable offside penalty on 4th and 4 before halftime.<\/p>\n

The penalty on James Thompson wasn\u2019t his fault, but a penalty nonetheless.<\/p>\n

The edge group didn\u2019t find success, either. Mykel Williams had a 12.5% pass-rush win rate. Nobody else was above 6%. And the combination of Mykel, Romello Height, and Keion White didn\u2019t get a tackle for loss, but they did miss two tackles.<\/p>\n

This performance feels like it\u2019s been coming for a month now. This group hasn\u2019t been sharp. The pass rush has been hiding them. When the pass rush doesn\u2019t get home or even give the illusion of pressure, receivers end up running open and unchallenging. Everything the Falcons did felt\u2026easy.<\/p>\n

The 49ers targeted the cornerbacks 12 times and allowed 9 receptions for 97 yards. The Falcons wideouts faced one contested catch.<\/p>\n

Sprinkle in a couple of ill-advised penalties at inopportune times, and you get a group that looks like they were the ones playing without multiple starters.<\/p>\n

The 49ers committed seven penalties for 55 yards, which may not sound like much on the surface, but they couldn\u2019t have happened at a worse time. A false start on the first play from scrimmage foreshadowed what was to come.<\/p>\n

Odighizwua\u2019s first offside penalty led to three points.<\/p>\n

Renardo Green had an illegal contact penalty on 2nd and 20. Jones was flagged for defensive holding on the same play.<\/p>\n

Thompson\u2019s offside call was on 3rd and 2.<\/p>\n

McCaffrey had a 10-yard run negated by a holding penalty on Connor Colby to begin the fourth quarter. That led to a down-and-distance situation the offense couldn\u2019t recover from.<\/p>\n

On 3rd and 4, when the game was 26-20, Brandin Cooks had a false start. Purdy\u2019s second interception came on the next play.<\/p>\n

The turnovers on the field were devastating for the 49ers. A promising drive ended when the young running backs fumbled on back-to-back plays, stripping the offense of a red-zone possession. The same offense that\u2019s scoring at the highest clip in the league in the red area.<\/p>\n

That drive was going to answer Atlanta\u2019s scoring drive.<\/p>\n

Purdy\u2019s first interception came on Atlanta\u2019s 25-yard line. He should have thrown it away and lived to fight another down. You can\u2019t make that decision, especially when you\u2019re in field goal range.<\/p>\n

The second interception came late in the fourth quarter with the offense around mid-field. Up until that point, it still felt like the 49ers would prevail.<\/p>\n

Kittle\u2019s game-ending fumble was the football gods telling the 49ers Week 7 wasn\u2019t meant to be.<\/p>\n

A few differences separate a true WR1 from a role player. One is contested situations. Jacob Cowing caught one of his two contested catches.<\/p>\n

Jordan Watkins, who played well, all things considered, caught one of his three. The end zone reception would\u2019ve been a difficult catch, but Watkins did the hard part. The same was true for the other target, who did everything but finish the catch through the ground.<\/p>\n

If Watkins wants to play in the NFL, those are the types of catches he has to make, no matter how difficult they may seem.<\/p>\n

Kittle couldn\u2019t haul in either of his contested catches — something we\u2019re not used to seeing. In a high-variance game where the Niners didn\u2019t benefit from turnover luck, they did themselves no favors in the contested catch department.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Francisco 49ers dropped their first game of the season against the Atlanta Falcons in Week 7.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":508161,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[101,8376,12729,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":["post-508160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-49ers-news","tag-san-francisco-49ers-scores-and-results","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=508160"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508160\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/508161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=508160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=508160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=508160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}