From: marshall@force.ssd.lmsc.lockheed.com (Bob Marshall)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.football.pro
Subject: 49ers/Seahawks
Date: 29 Aug 92 05:11:07 GMT
Reply-To: marshall@force.ssd.lmsc.lockheed.com
Organization: LMSC, Sunnyvale, California

The 49ers beat the Seahawks 24-17 to finish the preseason at 5-0. The final
score is misleading, as the 49ers rolled up a 24-0 halftime lead, and the
Seahawks scored late to close to within seven. All in all, the 49ers dominated.

Steve Young was the star of this game. He played the entire first half,
and part of the third quarter. If he could play at this level all the
time, there would be no QB controversy. Steve Bono relieved in the
third quarter, and started out pretty good, but overall he did very
little.

Jerry Rice came in and played like he hadn't missed a beat. First 49ers'
play : short completion to Rice. Second 49ers' play : 21-yard touchdown
pass to Rice. Boom, 7-zip. Simple as pie. He had another catch for a 
long gain, and he dropped a pass in the end zone that he usually catches.
He also caught a short 3-yard pass for a TD. Just another day at the
office : 2 TDs.

The 49ers' downtrodden secondary played an outstanding game. I don't
remember anyone getting burned. Eric Davis made an excellent interception.
On the other hand, the run defense looked a little bit shoddy, but Seattle
has some very good runners, so...

The 49ers put pretty good pressure on the Seattle QBs, who are not that
mobile. They had three sacks in the first half (two by Tim "Who needs
Charles Haley" Harris. He brought out his pistols on both sacks. Larry
Roberts had the other. Couple more sacks in the second half by the
second string.

Back to Young. I didn't catch his numbers, but he was just able to move
the 49ers at will. The highlight of the game came when he saw something
in the Seattle defense at the 8-yard line, and he pulled a quarterback
sneak for a touchdown. It wasn't a called play, and it wasn't an audible.
Not even the center knew he was going to do it. He just took the snap and
plowed right over the middle and landed in the end zone. What a hoot!
The receivers ran their pass patterns, the linemen dropped back into
pass-blocking position, and here goes Young straight up the middle!

A frightening scene occurred at the end of the first half. Kevin Lewis,
who is being groomed as a punt returner, was just finishing off a nice
punt return when he was slammed to the ground head-first at an awkward
angle. The replay showed that he went unconscious immediately, and it
took more than five minutes to get him off the field. Initially a
stretcher was brought out, but then an ambulance came out onto the
field. It took over five minutes to get him off the field. When he
came to he had no feeling in his legs and arms, but by the time he was put
into the ambulance he apparently had regained use of his arms and legs.
He was taken to the Stanford Medical Center, where preliminary reports
say that he may have a fracture between the 4th and 5th vertebrae.
What can you do, other than to pray that he will recover. Thoughts
of Darryl Stingley and Jeff Fuller go through my mind.

Special teams : Cofer kicker a 37(?)-yard field goal, but missed an
"extra-point"-field goal (from the one-yard line). On the miss, the
snap appeared to be lousy, and Bono's attempt to compensate for the
the lousy snap appeared to be lousy, so I don't think you can blame
Cofer here. The TV announcers didn't notice this, but the radio announcers
did. As for the punting : BLEEEAAAAHHHHHHHHHH. I didn't tabulate all
of Prokop's punts, but the ones I did tabulate were 35,32,27. Yecch.
I think even I could do better than that. And that doesn't even account
for the one that he failed to get off because of a marginally bad snap
(the snap was a little to the right, but chest high, and he bobbled it;
the Seahawks swarmed on him).

On the QB controversy : The plot thickens. Joe Montana was supposed to
make a cameo appearance tonight, but in a gesture that many people 
interpret to be defiant, Joe refused to play. The interpretation by
the insiders was "if I'm healthy enough to play, I'm healthy enough
to start.". Joe did not suit up tonight, but apparently threw on the
sidelines in street clothes just to reinforce the notion that he is well 
enough to play again; just not as a second-stringer.

OK, let's get down to business now..

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Bob Marshall                     \\     "It ain't age
Lockheed Missiles & Space Co.     \\     That makes me look this way
Sunnyvale, CA                      \\    It ain't the years, boys,
marshall@force.ssd.lmsc.lockheed.com\\   It's the miles"
"I tell the truth 'cept when I lie"  \\     - Chris LeDoux
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