SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- After an 0-5 start that includes four consecutive heartbreaking defeats by three points or fewer, it would be easy for the San Francisco 49ers and coach Kyle Shanahan to throw their hands up and turn the team's remaining 11 games over to its many young players in an effort to build for the future.
Asked Monday if he was considering making such a move in a season that appears to be lost before October is even over, Shanahan acknowledged it as a reasonable thought but explained why it's important not to lose sight of what the Niners are trying to build.
“I think it's a fair question, especially when you're 0-5," Shanahan said. "But, I think my goal right now is I try to keep perspective. I know I said that last week, too, but when you've lost four games in a row by a total of 11 points and all those being three points or less, I know that's happened two times in NFL history, first time since 1994, so I don't want to sit here and just make a ton of changes and totally go that direction."
Indeed, it should be noted right off the bat that the 49ers' commitment to a youth movement should never be in question. This is a team that kept 14 rookies on its initial 53-man roster, including five undrafted rookies and nine members of the 10-man draft class (running back Joe Williams was placed on injured reserve).
At multiple positions, the Niners opted for youth over a veteran option. They kept rookie C.J. Beathard as the backup quarterback over Matt Barkley. Matt Breida and Raheem Mostert made it over veteran Tim Hightower at running back, and Erik Magnuson won the backup center job over the experience of Tim Barnes, just to name a few.
In fact, San Francisco opened the season with the 10th-youngest roster and eighth-youngest starting lineup (average age of 26.41 years) in the league, including the third-youngest starting defense (24.91 years).
Some of those numbers have changed since the season began, but of the Niners' 22 starters on offense and defense, just seven are older than 26 and only four are 30 or older. Of that group of seven, five of them are offensive starters, with quarterback Brian Hoyer, center Daniel Kilgore, guard Brandon Fusco, receiver Pierre Garcon and tackle Joe Staley still in the starting lineup.
Clearly, Garcon and Staley aren't going to be exiting the starting lineup anytime soon, but that doesn't mean Shanahan isn't keeping a close eye on everything.
Shanahan already has showed a willingness to give some of his young players more opportunities, even if they aren't starters. That was evident Sunday when running back Carlos Hyde and linebacker NaVorro Bowman had their snaps reduced to make way for youngsters like Breida and Brock Coyle to get more opportunities.
While some have clamored for Beathard, in particular, to get an opportunity to replace Hoyer, that's a move Shanahan isn't ready to make yet, though it seems Beathard is likely to get his chance at some point.
“I think it's not just C.J., everything is on my mind," Shanahan said. "I look at every single position. You guys talk about Carlos, you guys talk about Bo [Bowman]. We can talk about the quarterback. There's no position on our team where it's, ‘Hey, you're starting, no questions asked. We're not going to look at anything.’ We evaluate everything. I know you do that every week, whether you're 5-0 or whether you're 0-5. Brian did some good things in that game [26-23 loss to Indianapolis]. By no means was it perfect. I still expect him to play better. I expect us all to play better, expect me to coach better. C.J. is doing a good job in practice. I think he's gotten better each week, and we'll continue to do that with him, and if we feel it's the best thing for the team, the best thing for C.J. and the players around him, that's when we'll do that.”
The bigger takeaway here is that Shanahan isn't a believer in making changes just for the sake of doing it. That's an important message to send to the locker room, especially for a coach in the first year of building a culture.
"Our guys have been in it and had a chance to win all these games," Shanahan said. "I'm as disappointed as anyone that they haven't. But, I also know that we very easily could be 4-1, and I definitely think it's somewhere in the middle of both of those two. I look into all that. I would never do that just to do it, especially at this time. I'm always going to try to do what I think gives us the best chance to win, because I still think we're really into this, and I do think we have had a chance to win these games. I think we've got to keep getting better, and whether that's with younger guys, older guys, I decide that based on how practice is going and how they look every day.”