Just as the San Francisco 49ers won’t miss seeing Aaron Donald lining up for the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday, Sean McVay won’t miss game planning against Christian McCaffrey and Deebo Samuel. Both 49ers stars are out with injuries for this weekend’s game at SoFi Stadium, which is a break for a struggling Rams defense.
McVay isn’t downplaying the overall effectiveness of the 49ers offense even without those two playmakers on the field, but he’s also not upset that they’ll be absent from the field.
It’s really a challenge with those two guys out,” he said Wednesday. “Hopefully they’ll be OK, but I’m not sad that they’re not playing against us. They are still as good as it gets offensively in this league.”
Samuel is a do-it-all receiver who helps the 49ers’ run game with McCaffrey out, too. He can carry it out of the backfield, catch screen passes or turn a short drag route into a big gain – something the Rams are very familiar with.
There’s no question San Francisco’s offense looks different without both of those players but the 49ers still have other dangerous players to account for.
“Those are great players that are tremendous assets for them,” McVay said. “Kyle [Shanahan] does a great job of being able to utilize the versatile skill sets that both of them have and the multitude of issues that they can present to put pressure on a defense. They have a lot of other guys that they do a great job doing that with as well. You look at the way that their backs have stepped in and done an outstanding job of really continuing to produce at a really high level in the first two games. Kyle has always heavily leaned on the run game and does a great job of being able to mix it up.
Three players the Rams will need to contain on Sunday are Jordan Mason, George Kittle and Brandon Aiyuk. Mason has ripped off back-to-back 100-yard games in his first two starts of the season, while Kittle is coming off a seven-catch, 76-yard, one-touchdown performance against the Vikings.
Aiyuk has gotten off to a slow start after missing training camp but he’s as precise a route runner as there is in the NFL and he should be more up to speed now that we’re in Week 3. The Rams will still have their hands full this weekend, even without McCaffrey and Samuel on the field.