All right, welcome in to Sport for Wednesday, September 16th.
Week one is officially in the books.
That means 16 games down, 256 to go in the regular season, 269 to go, including the playoffs, ending, of course, with Super Bowl 61 in Los Angeles on Valentine’s Day.
As always, there’s a lot to take away from week one.
There’s also a lot of reason to be cautious about things that we take away from week one cause as we said over and over and over again, week one can be a liar.
But you guys have questions and as always, we want to give you answers.
So we are here with a mailbag edition of the Breer Report.
And my first question for this week is coming from Nash the 2nd.
That’s at Nash_the_2cond on Twitter.
Nash asked, should the Rams be concerned about how they started the season, or is it too early to call?
I mean, I, I, I think the first thing I would start out with there, Nash, is the unique circumstances that they were facing coming into the year.
And that is nothing to do with Miles Garrett playing his first game and playing hurt.
It has nothing to do with Aaron Donald being unavailable for his first game.
It’s that they were in Australia.
So they were opening on a Thursday.
It’s that they were going into this unknown.
Um, where they had to figure out the best way to handle such a long flight, the time difference, all those different elements, the 49ers did too.
Um, I think a lot of people will look at this and look at the way the two teams played and see one team that looked ready to go and another that didn’t look ready to go.
That’s just what it is.
That’s how it appeared on the TV screen.
Um, and say that the 49ers handled it the right way, leaving a week early rather than.
Packing that trip into a, a, a couple of days.
Regardless, there is that element of it.
So I think that, you know, when you, when you wanna say take a grain of salt with anything that you digest from week one, it especially goes for this game because both those teams were facing such a weird and different circumstance.
So that’s number 1.
Number 2, Um, this, of course, is a rivalry that can go different ways and has gone different ways at different times.
And so, I would say that I would caution anybody to take too much from it, but there are a couple of things that I think are important to look at from a Rams perspective here.
And the first is when we’re talking about the history of that rivalry, and we’re talking about when the Niners have gotten the best of the Rams in this series, it happened in a way that looked very familiar to what we saw last Thursday night.
And that’s where the number one issue was, for all the talent that the Rams added on the defensive side of the ball, and they’ve added a ton of talent.
Um, they had Trent McDuffie, they had Jalen Watson, they had Miles Garrett, they’ve got Aaron Donald coming back, of course, Aaron Donald was in the game.
Yes, Garrett was playing hurt, but they’ve added a lot of talent towards a pretty good defense already.
And the most alarming thing to me in the entire game, offense, defense, special teams, whatever, was the Rams run defense.
And the fact that the Rams knew the Niners were coming at them, because that’s what the Niners always do.
The Niners believe that they are the more physical team when they play against the Rams, and that’s always been their edge.
So the Rams knew this was coming.
And the Niners still rushed for 174 yards on 30 carries.
And here’s the thing about that, is when you got Miles Garrett, you got Aaron, it’s scary to think about what the Rams could be in 3rd and long, right?
So, Garrett and Donald adding to a group that already is bringing back Byron Young and Kobe Turner and Braden Fisk.
It doesn’t matter if you can’t get into those obvious passing situations.
The way you attack a great pass rush is you run right at it, and you try to create 2nd and 6th, and you try to create 3rd and 2, and you try to prevent them from getting exotic or pinning their ears back.
Um, where you’re really in trouble with a team that’s built this way is when you get into those obvious passing situations, and in that way, this Rams defense was built to play with the lead.
The 49ers never let them get the lead.
The 49ers never let them get into those 3 long situations.
The Niners controlled the tempo and the tenor of this game.
This was gonna be a game that was played.
In a phone booth.
That’s the way the Niners, the Niners were able to take the game into that dark alley.
And again, that’s something that the Rams really need to look at.
And it’s not just Christian McCaffrey, by the way.
Kaylen Black, the rookie out of Indiana, had 65 yards on 14 carries.
So a total of 174 yards on 30 carries, you allow that sort of output, you allow that sort of game control to your opponent.
Generally, you aren’t gonna win the game.
The other concern that I would have, and this is a concern to me , that goes back to Um, the, the summer.
And the one thing that I heard people, you know, from opposing teams talk about with the Rams was team speed on offense.
And that the offense was built in such a way where it, do you have enough, where the defense is going to respect what you can do down the field.
And there is a story behind this too, how they got here, is And you look at the way the Seattle defense is built, and you look at the way that some of the, the, the, the, the Harbaugh family defenses, the Jesse Minors, the Mike McDonald’s, now, you know, you’ve got Dennard Wilson running it with the Giants, Wink Martin Dale was one of the godfathers of it.
That style of defense where you are betting that you can play nickel the entire game, and you have the super-sized safety who is a freak show and can play linebacker and can play safety, and that’s Kyle Hamilton in Baltimore, that’s Derwin James in LA, that’s Nicky Minorri in Seattle.
13 personnel was in a lot of ways to combat that.
Going 13 personnel and investing in tight ends and being able to roll that personnel grouping out there was in so many ways, a counter to what we’ve seen from those sorts of defenses playing that style.
It was like, OK, you want to go small, we’re going to get big, and we’re gonna be able to take advantage of you with our big people, both in the passing game and in the running game, and it’s worked.
But in building the offense that way, do you give up a little bit from a speed standpoint?
And that’s, I think a little bit of what we saw um on Thursday.
Is that lack of someone to take the top off the defense, wound up hurting them in the pass game, wound up hurting them a bit in the run game, and, and, and look , look who’s on the other side, it’s Raheem Morris, who knows the Rams program really well .
Uh, they, the Rams only had two plays in the entire game of over 16 yards.
Both of them were completions to Puka Nkua.
One of them was a, a deep outcut, um, which Puka caught and ran for 41 yards.
And the other one was a deep cross to Nkua, like an in cut about 20 yards down the field.
Nikua winds up picking up 23 yards on that.
That’s it.
And so, that’s another thing that I think you’ve got to look at if you’re the Rams.
If there’s any long-term concern, I think they’re gonna be just fine.
Don’t get me wrong, we are picking knits here and this is, again, a champagne problem type of thing where you’ve got to tie up a few things.
Um, but the run defense with the group that they put together, I think you at least have a little bit of concern on that.
And look, like I think with, with, with, with Aaron Donald, um, you know, it’s part of the equation, like, Aaron Donald’s not coming in to, to help shore up the run defense.
Aaron Donald’s coming in to play in nickel and dime situations where you can put him out there and match him up with fresh legs and get after the passer.
You know, Miles Garrett is a great pass rusher.
Um, what are we gonna see with him against the run?
Because he was really good against, he was really good in Cleveland, but if he’s got this bulky knee, how’s it gonna affect him?
Um, it’s a real concern.
It’s something that they, that they know they gotta clean up, and then again, the ability to threaten teams down the field offensively, the ability to churn out big plays offensively.
Um , I, I think, you know, when the Rams went back and brought back Tutu Atwell, a lot of people took at it, it as, is this a sign of trouble with Pukunakua, that the suspension is coming, whatever, um.
I think they missed the mark on that.
I think this is what it is.
I think it’s that you saw out there an inability to really threaten the Niners downfield, which allowed the Niners to play a little bit more aggressively on defense and something that, you know, like I think Raheem Morris was able to pick up on and exploit because he knows the Rams program so well.
Again, I don’t have a huge long-term concern with the Rams.
I think they’re gonna be just fine, but those would be two of the things that I would come out of that game.
Um, with at least, uh, uh, I feel that I need to fix this if I’m, if I’m LA.
Question number 2 is from Jeff Miler, that’s at Miller 32.
Can you explain the Joey Porter Jr contract situation?
I’ve read he wants top tier guaranteed money, but I don’t recall him ever being mentioned as one of the top tier corners.
Is he considered top tier by the league?
Jeff, I, I would say, Joey Porter is seen as a good, not great player.
And I, I think at this point, you know, looking at where the corner market has gone, we see a clear delineation in how the top players are getting paid, then how the guys at the second level are getting paid.
And the gap here is interesting because The top of the corner market has moved.
It just hasn’t moved as fast as the other positions.
It hasn’t moved as fast as the receiver market has moved.
It certainly hasn’t moved as fast as the edge rusher market has moved where it went from Miles Garrett at 40, who took that number from the mid-30s to 40 in March of 2025, to Micah Parsons last summer at 46, Aiden Hutchinson at 45, and then, of course, this offseason, Will Anderson gets to 50.
It has not moved that way .
Um, so you look at the guys at the top of the market.
Patrick Certan moved the market significantly when he got a deal at $24 million per year.
That was two years ago.
So that was in the summer of 2024.
Then offseason, last year, in the offseason, Derrek Stingley boost the market to $30 million and since then, we’ve seen incremental movement.
So we’ve seen it go from Stingley at 30, to sauce at 31, 30.1, to McDuffie at 31 this offseason, to Denzel Ward at 31.1, to Devin Witherspoon this summer at 33, and then Christian Gonzalez at 33.75. It’s slowly moved up.
It’s slowly inched forward.
And then you see the second tier of the market, and it mirrors the top of the market.
So, you know, we see a deal that’s, that, that, that, that’s aged now, but Jalen Johnson in Chicago gets 19.
Alonte Taylor was a free agent.
Um, played with the Saints, signed with the Titans.
He gets 19.3 million per year.
And then Deron Bland gets 22.5 million from the Cowboys.
Um, that was last year.
So, we’ve seen the top of the market move slowly, the bottom of the market move slowly, or the second tier of the market move slowly, and you have this gap in between.
And I, I think the way you want to look at this is, Joey Porter Junior was probably anticipating the top of the move of the market moving, moving faster.
And so his expectation was a little bit higher, even if he Even if he isn’t, even if he wasn’t gonna wind up at the top of the market, the Steelers see him as a little bit more of the second tier of the market.
And there’s a really significant gap if you’re talking from a percentage standpoint.
Again, if you look at Tyron Bland as being the top of the second tier, he’s at just over 22.
Gonzalez is at 30, at 33.
75%.
Bland’s deal is on an average per year basis, 2/3 of what Gonzalez’s deal is.
So, That to me is a significant gap.
That to me colors where the Steelers might be, where Joey Porter might be, so he’s gonna play it out.
It’ll be interesting to see whether or not they franchise him next year.
Um, it’d be interesting to see what he gets.
He’s a very good player, but is he a great player?
I think that’s the question.
Finally.
Question number 3, this is from Ryan Adair.
That’s at RNA dare 26.
He asked, where should the panic meter be on Davis Webb and the Broncos’ offense?
How long before Sean takes over play calling, or would that just destroy the confidence of Bo and DW oh, Davis Webb, of course.
Um, so, I would say, Ryan, I, I would not be close to jamming on the panic button here, and I am going to give you something that I would hope gives you a little confidence.
I think one of the best play callers on either side of the ball in all football over the last five years has been Mike McDonald.
And if you rewind to 2022, when he first got back to the NFL, first became a play caller in the NFL, coming back from Michigan, going to the Ravens, and you look at the first couple of games that year, it did not look good.
In fact, there was a game in there where the Dolphins scored 70 on the Ravens, and there were a lot of questions.
Did John Harbaugh get this wrong?
How is this all gone haywire?
How are we gonna, how are we gonna fix this?
There are all kinds of questions.
And John Harbaugh stuck with a young guy that he really trusted.
And by the end of that year, Mike McDonald was a very proficient play caller.
By the next year, you could argue he was the best defensive coordinator in football.
The year after that, he becomes the head coach of the Seahawks, and we all know what’s happened since.
I just think you have to give these things time.
And that was a really challenging environment that that offense was going into.
It’s loud at Arrowhead Stadium.
The operation of the offense can be affected by the crowd noise, and that is a defense that I, I’m telling you, Steve Spagnola, you can ask Jordan Love about this cause one of the One of the, the, the, the flashpoints in Jordan Love’s career was his first start came at Arrowhead against Steve Spagnolo, and Steve Spagnolo basically threw the kitchen sink at him, and Jordan Love came out of that game with so much to learn, and he figured out how far he had to go, and it really wound up helping him developmentally that he had to face Steve Spagnolo in that defense.
For a new play caller, same thing.
Having to go up against in a play caller as experienced and with as much applicable experience in these sort of blood in the water situations, I think it was a really tough place for Davis Webb to start.
And it showed the numbers.
Look, Bo Nix, 17 to 28, 131 yards, a touchdown, a pick, uh, not good.
The run game, just 61 yards on 15 carries, they didn’t have as much of a chance to establish it and stick with it late in the game as the game.
Got away from them.
So much of what the, the, the Broncos do is, is based on their physicality and their ability to run it.
I, you know, JK Dobbins, 8 carries, RJ Harvey, 3 carries, that’s not what you’re looking for.
I still think we saw flashes of what they can be.
We still haven’t gotten the Jalen Waddle, the, the full Jalen Waddle yet, you know, so you can take that into account.
Evan Ingram, I thought looked good.
Pat Bryant, who they believe could be, you know, for Sean Payton, what Marcus Colston, what a young Marcus Colston was in New Orleans .
I think you saw him taking a step.
There are still a ton of reasons to be optimistic the Broncos are gonna get it.
Um, Sean Payton really believes in Davis Webb.
I can tell you that point blank.
Like this is a, this was not an easy thing for him to do, but he believed it was the right thing to do for the Broncos, and that’s not about getting it right for one week.
That’s about getting it right for the year.
That’s about getting it right in a year when they believe that they’re very much a Super Bowl contender, if not one of the favorites to go to Inglewood on Valentine’s Day and hoist the trophy.
Um, at the end of that night.
So, I would say it’s not time to panic.
I would say that was a very tough spot to start in.
And now, like, just like Jordan Love is a quarterback, I think Davis Webb as a coach will take a lot from having had to face Spagnolo in his first game as a play caller, and that.
Environment in a night game at Arrowhead.
Appreciate you guys coming out.
As always, you can leave more questions or any comments down below here on the YouTube page.
You can also get to me on my social media at Albert Breer on Twitter, at Albert Aubrey on Facebook, at Albert_Breer on Instagram.
Appreciate you guys coming out.
We got one more Breer report coming for you this week.
We’ll see you on Friday.
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