What if the 49ers won Super Bowl 54?
The weight of expectations would eventually catch up, but what about the 2021 draft? And what about the Chiefs? Join us for a walk through a weird alternate timeline.
Last Friday, we wandered through an alternate version of 2020 where Drew Brees had retired before the season began. It’s possible Tom Brady could’ve been the Saints’ quarterback and they could’ve been the defending Super Bowl champs instead of their rivals in Tampa. But, the three of us didn’t *quite* see things unfolding like that in this other NFL timeline.
Still, we got a kick out of playing the “what if” game and picturing how one decision could alter the entire NFL landscape. And hopefully you enjoyed reading about it … and if you missed it last week, go ahead and click the link and take a few to catch up. We’ll wait.
...
Oh hey, welcome back! As a little treat, we’ve got another hypothetical ready to go. This time, we’re once again traveling back to winter 2020. (Granted, of all the things we could change about this time in our history, the NFL is pretty low on the list of priorities, but we’re trying to have a little fun here.)
On Feb. 2, 2020, the Chiefs beat the 49ers in Super Bowl 54, ending both the Chiefs’ 50-year championship drought and Andy Reid’s reign as the winningest coach without a title. Although the 31-20 score looks like a healthy margin of victory on the surface, the 49ers arguably should’ve won the game. After all, they’re the ones who had a double-digit lead halfway through the fourth quarter. If just one or two plays had swung differently, then the 49ers could’ve easily won their sixth Super Bowl in franchise history and first in 25 years.
Alas or thankfully, depending on your rooting interest, that’s not what happened — except in our imaginations and/or in a parallel universe. So once again, join us on a trip to another world where we’ll explore how the NFL would’ve changed if the 49ers had been Super Bowl 54 champs. — SH
In this alternate timeline, what did the 49ers do differently to win Super Bowl 54?
Sarah Hardy: If Kyle Shanahan had just been a little more aggressive early on — like not settling for field goals against a team quarterbacked by a sorcerer — the 49ers could’ve built a lead too big for even the Chiefs to overcome. (I know that same Chiefs team came back from a 24-point deficit in the Divisional Round, but that was against the Texans, who had a much, much worse defense than the 49ers.)
Let’s say one of two things happened: either the 49ers scored touchdowns on the two drives when they kicked field goals, or George Kittle wasn’t called for OPI right before halftime and the 49ers put up a TD on the next play. Instead of being up 10 points with 8 minutes to go in the game, they could’ve been up 17 or 18. As elite as the Kansas City offense was season, think of what, mentally, it’d feel like being down by that margin in the *Super Bowl* without a lot of time left.
Remember, this wasn’t Tom Brady and the Patriots, with all of that Super Bowl experience, turning the Falcons into a meme. It was the Chiefs, who hadn’t won a championship since the 1969 season, trying to do it against an elite defense for a franchise with a rich Super Bowl history. For as great as Patrick Mahomes is — and was for the final 8 minutes against the 49ers — he was pretty crappy in the game up until that point. Maybe he can’t turn things around this time if the 49ers had more of a cushion.
Christian D’Andrea: Honestly? All it takes is one fewer brain fart from Jimmy Garoppolo and that victory parade is rolling through the Bay Area instead of western Missouri. Back in a past life I broke down all the times the Niners would have kept it together in the second half if Garoppolo simply defaulted to his best player and threw the damn ball to George Kittle:
Maybe Patrick Mahomes would have still found a way to ruin San Francisco’s night with some superhuman performance. Maybe Garoppolo’s retreat inward to a simpler time where he didn’t know how or why to read a defense robbed us of a chance to see Mahomes throw a back-foot 85-yard Hail Mary to win the game. What we do know is Garoppolo was bad enough to cost his team a title and ultimately convince Kyle Shanahan to mortgage his draft future to acquire an FCS quarterback instead.
If that doesn’t happen, the Niners win and Kansas City drowns its sorrows in smoked meat.
Ryan Van Bibber: Conservative coaching is kind of a Super Bowl tradition, at least early in the game, but my god, the Niners kicking the field goal on fourth-and-5 from the Chiefs’ 20 on the first drive was maddening to see. Like Christian said, just go for it. Even if they ended up with no points on that drive, it still sets the tone for an aggressive game plan. And then to do it again to start the second half?! Has he already lost faith in Garoppolo at this point? I can’t imagine that would have been the case since they did make it to the Big Game.
I don’t wonder if Kyle Shanahan is officially cursed with bad Super Bowl mojo now.
How would the 2020 season have changed for the 49ers as defending Super Bowl champs?
SH: They were headed for disappointment either way; it just would’ve hit a little bit differently if the 49ers had won the Super Bowl.
There was probably no avoiding their historically bad injury luck. However, the way the 2020 season actually unfolded, the 49ers have to face the very real possibility they missed their Super Bowl window. If they were coming off a championship, then the injuries in 2020, while still a bummer, wouldn’t feel quite as catastrophic.
CD: I’m not sure it would have changed all that much. The Niners’ talented roster mostly returned for last season; their two biggest free agent departures were Emmanuel Sanders and Levine Toilolo. The problem was that injuries absolutely decimated that returning roster; only five players started all 16 games last year.
Garoppolo was limited to six games. Nick Bosa played two. Raheem Mostert missed half the season. George Kittle did too. Maybe a Super Bowl win means veterans chasing a ring may have considered the West Coast and given San Francisco some badly needed depth. Even so, they'd have just as well considered Kansas City or a chance to play with Tom Brady in Tampa. No matter what, the football gods would not abide a winning season for the 49ers in 2020.
RVB: As far as the season itself, it’s hard to see how it really could have been much different. Getting to the Super Bowl obviously contributed to the rash of injuries that plagued them in 2020. Maybe there’s some ephemeral situation where winning it all gives them a little more confidence to play through the injuries and turn some of those losses into wins. Their first two losses of the season featured margins of four and five points, so if they win those close games, maybe it gives them a little edge to scrap through the rest of the season. Because after that, their next six losses are all by 10 or more points. Still, an 8-8 finish given the injuries would have been a small miracle.
How would the 2020 season have changed for the Chiefs as Super Bowl runners-up?
SH: The Chiefs approached the 2020 offseason like a team looking to run it back. If they had come up short in the Super Bowl, though, I think they would have made a couple splashy moves, focusing on their weaknesses (such as linebacker, cornerback) rather than, more or less, staying the same.
They still needed to pay Mahomes, and maybe without a Super Bowl ring, he’d come a little cheaper. But he was always going to receive a record-setting extension, which would hamper the Chiefs’ ability to go *too* big in free agency. So maybe they’re a little bolder during the draft — trade up to grab Patrick Queen in the first round, or trade down a little to acquire the draft capital to get both a cornerback (like Trevon Diggs) and a running back (J.K. Dobbins or A.J. Dillon) on Day 2.
I’m not sure if any team in the AFC could stop them in this timeline, either, but I still think their injuries, especially along on the offensive line, would catch up to them in the Super Bowl against a Bucs defense with the perfect plan to slow them down.
CD: We would likely have seen the aggressive moves the Chiefs made after 2021’s loss — jettisoning some starters, acquiring an unhappy rising star (in this case, maybe A.J. Green takes Orlando Brown’s spot when Sammy Watkins gets cut?). More importantly, I don’t think they would have addressed the 2020 draft as a luxury where they could take a 5’7 tailback in the first round. Instead, they would have bulked up a secondary that just allowed Jimmy by-god Garoppolo to win a Super Bowl by adding a player like Jaylon Johnson, Trevon Diggs, or Antoine Winfield Jr.
Any one of those guys would have helped boost a mediocre passing defense into a pretty good one (particularly if the Chiefs still took L’Jarius Sneed in the fourth round). It would have been especially damaging if Kansas City also stole Winfield away from the Bucs. Are those changes, along with the motivation of losing the big game in 2020, enough to lead to a Super Bowl win in 2021?
Yeah, that makes sense to me.
RVB: Yeah, I’d think they would have put more emphasis on defense and depth. Losing both starting offensive tackles isn’t really something they could have foreseen headed into 2020, but maybe they don’t get into a situation where Mike Remmers is protecting Mahomes.
Do the 49ers still trade up to draft Trey Lance in this scenario?
SH: My first instinct is to say no, that the 49ers would view 2020 as an aberration and that they could just replicate their 2019 success once fully healthy again.
But the more I think about it, the more I think Shanahan would’ve seen how being aggressive paid off in the Super Bowl and would’ve kept that mentality when it came to roster moves too. He also could’ve looked to the Eagles an example of how quickly things can fall apart. If you can’t trust a quarterback to stay healthy or to make the right decisions during a game, then it doesn’t matter if he helped you win a Super Bowl. Move on to a younger, cheaper, perhaps better option (one day anyway).
If Shanahan fell in love with Lance’s potential as much as it appears, then I can easily imagine him, as cold-blooded as it might seem, still going all-in on Lance as the future franchise quarterback.
CD: Nope. Garoppolo hit Kittle for a couple clutch fourth downs in our what-if game to manage his way to a Super Bowl ring. 2020 still sucks, but a mid-round first round selection means Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch can be a little more patient in their wait for a franchise QB. That means they’d still have to trade up in 2021, but instead of shipping three first-round picks to the Dolphins, the Niners would throw a Day 2 pick to the Broncos to move up from their spot in the teens.
That would put them in prime position to steal Justin Fields away from a hungry Bears team … but instead, Shanahan would get the guy he wanted all along. Mac Jones.
RVB: This is where the scenario gets weird. Winning the Super Bowl probably shouldn’t change the Niners trading up and drafting a QB, but I think it would have. Garoppolo would have been a Super Bowl winning quarterback, like Trent Dilfer and Joe Flacco. I wonder too if that might have changed things with his contract situation. The 2020 league year was the last year he was due any guaranteed money.
They probably would have held steady on Garoppolo’s contract. Then, I think they keep the 12th pick, or whatever mid-first they likely would have had in our what-if scenario, and take defensive help with that pick. Or maybe they grab Mac Jones there, since maybe the Patriots or someone else with Jones on their board finds Shanahan’s interest in Jones to be convincing enough to trade up. I think the most likely outcome is they take one of the day two QBs; I could see Kellen Monds going there with a bright future under Shanahan.
Better yet, maybe they somehow convince the Packers to swing a trade that brings them Aaron Rodgers. I would have loved to see how that played out when Shanahan inevitably kicks a field goal on fourth-and-2 in the playoffs and Rodgers throws another public fit about his coach, setting up another saga there for the 2022 offseason.
Heading into the new season, what are the expectations for both the 49ers and Chiefs in this other version of 2021?
SH: They’re each feeling the heat in their own way. The 49ers would be hoping to recapture the magic of two seasons ago, but there would be questions about their ability to stay healthy and what the addition of Lance might do to a locker room that has won a title together.
The Chiefs are, in my timeline, back-to-back Super Bowl losers, the likes of which the NFL hasn’t experienced since the Bills lost four in a row. They’d have regained their reputation as a great regular season team that always chokes when the playoffs roll around. Mahomes and Andy Reid (still without a championship in his coaching career in this universe) would be under intense pressure to finally deliver a Super Bowl win, and if they couldn’t get it done in 2021, then Reid might end up getting the ax … though maybe this is how Eric Bieniemy finally gets a head coaching job.
CD: The Chiefs are defending champs, which means their 2020 approach now applies to 2021. Brown still arrives from Baltimore, since Mitchell Schwartz is still considering retirement, Eric Fisher isn’t that great, and last spring’s deal is a win/win for both sides. Without Edwards-Helaire in the lineup Le’Veon Bell gets enough playing time that he doesn’t throw Andy Reid under the bus on Instagram in the offseason. Everything else feels like it would mostly stay the same.
The 49ers would have more at stake. Expectations would be high and 2020’s failures would feel more like a function of Garoppolo’s absence rather than his low-impact, high-turnover passing game. His win/loss record would supercede his interception rate and target depth, at least until the wheels come off in 2021 and fans start making noise about how Mac Jones looks in practice.
RVB: Expectations would be crushing for the Niners. Less so than if they’d had better luck with team health in 2020, but still above what they could realistically achieve with Garoppolo under center. Unless I’m way off and they find a way to beef up the rest of the team so the QB isn’t carrying a huge load, like they did in our reimagining of the 2020 Super Bowl outcome. Still, it’s hard to see them getting past the 2020 Buccaneers.
For the Chiefs, I mean, things don’t really change. They have another good team for a while that can’t go all the way, so it’s not unlike the Marty Ball era of the 90s. I’d feel for Andy Reid though, more a victim of circumstance in this scenario, but tarred with the reputation of a coach who can’t win a Super Bowl.