2014 NFC West will be the battle of the birds.

[Seahawk Sailor]

Agree with this premise completely. I've speculated that the 49ers are a team on the decline. Hard to imagine they continue a 4th year of challenging for the Super Bowl. Even the greatest teams have a hard time doing this, and the 49ers are not in that echelon of teams..

What makes you say this?

If the NFC Championship defeat has done anything, it probably sharpened the Niners focus and desire to get back on top of the NFC. They certainly still have the young talent to continue to play well, we just have to hope that D-Baugh continues to implode the Niners from the inside.

Others have already addressed this somewhat, and I mentioned above why I think the 49ers will regress, but I'll add a couple more thoughts, explain it a bit further. It's hard to maintain that caliber of play for more than a few years, and they have already done so for three. Their running back is getting old, and won't be as durable as he has been. Teams are starting to figure out that containing Kaepernick's first read and spying a defender against the run can stop their offense. They were very bruised and battered to end the year. It won't surprise many people if they regress somewhat. And that NFC Championship defeat may sharpen their desire to get back to the top, but it'll be the fourth year running they say "we were thiiiiiiis close; next year's the year for sure!"

They'll still be one of the better teams in the league, but if they're even a game or two worse, and the Cardinals are about the same, they'll switch places in the NFC West easily. It doesn't mean either team will be on the same level (probably) as the Seahawks, but they'll be tough teams.

 

[MizzouHawkGal]

I'm not buying a San Francisco regression until I see 4-6 games of the upcoming season. Like us if they manage to draft a vertical threat it's game on and Arizona is a memory.

 

[MizzouHawkGal]

That game was an outlier of epic proportions. End of story.

I'd say an outlier of epic proportions would be Super Bowl XL in favor of the Stealers. The Cardinals didn't get lucky all day, they got lucky once.

I guess it is a matter of degree but regardless that game was an obvious outlier. So far I see nothing to give anyone any reason to believe Arizona is anymore then third place in this division.

 

[RolandDeschain]

I guess it is a matter of degree but regardless that game was an obvious outlier. So far I see nothing to give anyone any reason to believe Arizona is anymore then third place in this division.

*Than.

 

[MizzouHawkGal]

I guess it is a matter of degree but regardless that game was an obvious outlier. So far I see nothing to give anyone any reason to believe Arizona is anymore then third place in this division.

*Than.

One of the few times I use "then" and you get me. Dammit!

 

[loafoftatupu]

I guess it is a matter of degree but regardless that game was an obvious outlier. So far I see nothing to give anyone any reason to believe Arizona is anymore then third place in this division.

*Than.

One of the few times I use "then" and you get me. Dammit!

You are allowed at least one auto correct excuse for every 10 posts

 

[RolandDeschain]

You are allowed at least one auto correct excuse for every 10 posts

Well, you just used two of them for not hyphenating "auto-correct" and not ending your sentence with any punctuation.

 

[FreshlySnipes]

It will be battle of the 3 birds... the Cardinals, the Seahawks and the Bird the Seahawks will give to the 49ers on the way to SuperBowl 49!!! :th2thumbs: :49ersmall:

 

[theascension]

Kaepernick as amazing an athlete as he is in every statistical category regressed as a passer. Yes there were injuries but he still didn't look anywhere near elite in the playoffs surviving and putting the team in position with his legs.
49ers MIGHT regress to 3rd place next year but they still have a better Quarterback than Cards or Rams. If the Rams get lucky and get a surprise QB rookie talent, and they do have 2 first round picks remember, I'd fear them a lot.
I just somewhat feel like Kaep will never become a great passer and sort of reside in that Michael Vick or Steve Mcnair category in years to come.

 

[Subzero717]

He was without Crabtree most of the year. The Niners had six games against us, the Cards and Rams combined. On top of playing Carolina and NO in the Superdome. Those are off the top of my head. Not worth looking up just things I know and staistcally they may or may nor show anything. In the plyoffs he played Carolina on the road and us at home. If not for him they had no chance at least against us. He turned the ball over but had he not done his part it was moot because his recievers werent open the first half and Gore had nothing.

Im not a Kaep fan by any stretch but I think the homer hate he gets sometimes is a little overboard. Look at RW statiscally the last four games of the season. Its pretty understandable why he didnt throw for 500 yds and 4 tds in each game to me. Why when Kap in similar situations is it different?

 

[IndyHawk]

The Cards did beat the Hawks at home but you have to remember their coach was Indy's coach the year before ..I have to think the guy got plenty of imfo from the Colts ect on what works ect..I don't think the Cards will be a serious threat to take the division unless Palmer wants to be a game manager with safe passes and lots of handoffs,it's not something Palmer or their coach can embrace..I think the threat is the Rams ..If they can put it all together and Bradford doesn't screw things up ..I see another SEA/SF battle for the top though ..

 

[Veilside]

Oddly enough my old roomate just went to some event in Arizona that had Joe Theisman speaking at it. He ended up sitting at the same table for dinner as him so they talked football. Apparently Joe is picking the Cards to win the NFC west. I found it odd but I hadnt really been keeping up on their offseason moves much either.

Could also be a bit of bias if Joe lives in Arizona too. Who knows, just found it interesting to go with this topic.

 

[Veilside]

Oh he also mentioned that he sees the niners regressing this season.

 

[Diezel Dawg]

Who cares who Joe Theismann picks, he hasn't been relevant in 20 years of commentating

 

[Veilside]

Who cares who Joe Theismann picks, he hasn't been relevant in 20 years of commentating

Well there you go. Are you now going to go down the list and tell us all the other ex nfl players/analysts whos opinions we shouldn't care about or maybe you could just save time and tell us that no ones opinions matter because no one can see the future.

I think we forget that fact sometimes so you should probably be the one to swoop on in to remind us.

 

[monkey]

By the way I didnt choose the 49'ers because of their deteriorating age at the D-line , MLB Bowman will most likely miss half the season, and their once good secondary is now a joke to me with so many departures and weak free agent signings in Safety Antoine Bathea and CB Chris Cooks .

I'm tempted to agree that the Cards might be the next best team(I haven't ruled out the Rams completely either for that matter) but the Niners will still be a tough, tough team.
The problem with picking the Cards ahead of the Niners or anyone else for that matter is, no matter how good the rest of that team gets, (and that defense is stupidly awesome) they'll still be held back by their lousy QB play.
Palmer isn't the leagues worst QB, but he's not that far off, and he's certainly not showing signs of getting better with age.

With Palmer at QB, they seem destined to be a 9, maybe 10 win team at the absolute most. Anything is possible of course, but I have a hard time seeing them do any better.

 

[Baba Ganoush]

I respect a lot of the opinions on this board. As a Niner fan I feel that we have a lot to prove in the secondary. A lot of turnover and uncertainty in that area of the team.

I am excited about the development of young players like McDonald, Patton, Lemonier, Dial and of course Carradine and Lattimore. If, and thats a big if, these players develop it will help prolong our "window"

That being said, it is really all about the development of Kaep. If he does not continue to get bbetter at progression reads then it won't mmatter. I think that is part of the reason he has not been signed yet.

 

[theENGLISHseahawk]

Arizona a bit overrated for me.

We hammered them on the road last season, it shouldn't have been as close as it was for a period. Our line sucked that day without any of our key starters and it showed.

They lost both games to San Fran and when they beat us, it was one of those freaky days where you can get away with a quarterback throwing four interceptions. We had a classic off day, showed by the way we won out after to win the Super Bowl.

Arians is a very good coach and they have some good players, but they also have a QB who turns 35 this year and is declining and Veldheer needs to prove he can stay healthy.

Seattle/San Fran have to start the year as favourites. The other two are still chasing.

 

[Tical21]

Arizona is the 3rd best team in football. Unfortunately the top 2 also reside in their division.

 

[minormillikin]

A couple seasons ago, when we beat the Cards 58-0, someone here linked a story of a foreigners account of the game. He called it a "bird derby." I will always think of Seahawks v. Cardinals as the Bird Derby.

In any case, the days of 58-0 are over for a while.