WhoDat!656

San Francisco special teams coordinator/assistant head coach Brad Seely. He thought of the cool play that turned out to be vitally important in the Niners' win at St. Louis. In situations when San Francisco failed to pick up a new sets of downs on third down and were left in field-goal range, why not have a receiver amble to the sideline but not all the way off the field? So they practiced it a couple of times, having Crabtree head off, hoping the defense would believe he's out of play and that only 10 players were on the field.

When it was called Sunday, Akers had the option to kill the play and attempt the field goal if he thought the Rams were getting wise. But the play worked to a T, and Akers saw Crabtree near the sidelines and the Rams ignoring him. This is what I like about the 49ers -- they're not married to the conventional way of doing things. That's a good reason they're 13-3 and have the second seed in the NFC playoffs.


Read more: Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees make NFL MVP race interesting - Peter King - SI.com

"A Veteran is someone who, at one point in his life, wrote a blank check made payable to "The United States of America" for an amount of "up to and including my life."

FireVenturi

Yea we ran that play in high school, it worked then as well, lol...

SaintPauly

The niners have gotten by on smoke and mirrors in alot of games this season. That will end very soon....

Rugby Saint II

Well said. Spot on.

homerj07

& they are the team we would see in the second round!!

Michigan_SF

The Buffalo Bills did that to us in 2009. We better have learned from it.

Saintsfan4ever

Saints better be ready for a host of trick plays going forward. A conventional offensive shootout with the Saints is not a winning formula for any opponent in the playoffs right now. I'd be ready for trickery on every snap.

Tobias-Reiper

Total lack of awareness by the Rams players and the Rams coaching staff, and a stupid comment by king.

If I am a coach or a player and I see a WR (and how could they not know Crabtree is a WR) going towards the sideline during a FG attempt, it means either one of 2 things: either there were 12 men in the huddle, or they are trying something. And, if I can't count that quickly and scream "12 men" to the refs, or see one of my players react immediately to the WR, I call a TO.. Most likely, I'd just call the time out.

'Cause the simple man pays the thrills, the bills and the pills that kill

Euphoria

We have a smart team for the most part... most trick plays don't work against us... I do have to say that.

Our guys stay home and we put 2 people on the gunners usually... we try running it back most times and hardly go for the block... I mean after all we have DS who'll take it to the house if they aren't careful.

What I think we need to do is on 4th and 5 or less... we go for it!!!

Yes!!! We have the best 3rd down conversion in the NFL... why now use the extra down to convert if we have to. Keep from giving the ball to the other high potent offenses and keep the pressure off our D more.

E U P H O R I A

SaintsBro

Yeah, except for last year's Cleveland Browns game. That was like a symposium on trick plays, with Greg McMahon on the losing end every time. But yeah, I agree, they are a smart team for the most part.