No soft landing for Shanahan and the Niners

A record audience watches a reasonable plan go awry at the Super Bowl

A predictable avalanche arrived on Tuesday. The 58th Super Bowl had the best ratings in the game’s history, beating last year’s record by 7 percent. In fact, only the 1969 moon landing is the only telecast it didn’t surpass. That was the July night when Americans gathered in delight and wonder as Neil Armstrong stepped down the ladder, set his foot on the lunar surface and asked, “What the hell was Shanahan thinking?”

Over 123 million people watched the Chiefs come from behind, finish beating themselves and start beating the 49ers, in overtime. Yes, that means more than 200 million people in America did not watch the Super Bowl. They are all around us, believe it or not.

The game came very close to infringing on spring training, but these days the NFL plops its 800-pound self anywhere it wants. It has booted the NBA off its Christmas Day pedestal, and baseball might well consider moving its postseason to August, the way the PGA Tour did, to get out of the way. This year’s Kansas City-Buffalo game, which wasn’t even an AFC Championship, drew more than five million more viewers than the five 2023 World Series games — put together. That was Texas vs. Arizona, a product of a baseball postseason format that almost begs for upsets that wipe out the best teams early. But even if the Dodgers somehow engage the Yankees in the 2024 Series, they won’t threaten the NFL. Baseball may have very strong local markets with many devoted fan bases. It is not a national sport, not anymore.

In 2022, a group waited for a Friday night table at Rio Grande, a popular restaurant in Boulder, Co. There were five television sets over the bar. A couple of them were showing extreme sports, one was showing mixed martial arts, and absolutely none was showing Game 1 of the World Series, an attractive matchup between Houston and Philadelphia. The Series starts too late and, these days, it’s at the end of a confusing and interminable playoff season that only the most devout seamheads can track.

The Texas-Arizona series, which the Rangers won in five more or less routine games, averaged nine million viewers. In 2016, when the Cubs won their first World Series since numbers appeared on the backs of the jerseys, the Series averaged 22.8 million viewers and drew 40 million for Chicago-Cleveland Game 7. But in 1978, when the Dodgers and Yankees held a rematch and there was the snap and crackle of Reggie Jackson and George Steinbrenner, the Series averaged 44 million viewers.

But the College Football Playoff also spanks baseball. The Michigan-Alabama game was concocted at Florida State’s expense, set in the Rose Bowl on yet another sun-kissed New Year’s Day, and drew 27.2 million.

Even the NFL draft last April had a 6.0 rating, 1.7 points higher than the World Series average.

There are innumerable reasons for this, most of which you know. One of the biggest is the rise of social media, which perfectly fits the irascibility and the opinionated nature of NFL fans. If you can use a keyboard you can join the cacophony. At the end of this Super Bowl, Kyle Shanahan was in the barrel, assailed from all sides because, when the 49ers won the coin toss before overtime, he asked for the ball.

It did not help that several 49ers said they didn’t know the new playoff overtime rules because Shanahan didn’t go over them. It also didn’t help that Andy Reid and the Chiefs supposedly discussed the new rules at every practice, even though Mecole Hardman said he wasn’t sure he’d actually scored the winning touchdown when he did.

But many fans weren’t aware the NFL had revamped playoff OT and guaranteed that each team would get at least one possession. Jim Nantz and Tony Romo were not a clarifying influence, although Nantz went on an inexplicable campaign to get Brent Musburger into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and Romo was singing Adele songs and stomping on his own analysis.

Shanahan got roasted nevertheless. The 49ers marched down the field, but forgot to block All-Pro Chris Jones on third down, and when Brock Purdy was hurried into a incompletion, they had to kick a field goal. Patrick Mahomes, of course, took the Chiefs downfield and beat the clock with the TD to Hardman.

How could Shanahan give Kansas City such an advantage?

He actually answered that question during his postgame press conference, although most people were too busy babbling to listen.

He wanted to let his defense catch its breath. It had been on the field for 23 of the previous 30 snaps. Until that moment, the Chiefs had only scored one touchdown, and that was on a 16-yard drive. Shanahan had reason to believe that they could stand up to Mahomes, given a breather. But without Dre Greenlaw, who busted his Achilles tendon merely by running onto the field, Mahomes was able to wound the 49ers with his runs. Whether he’s the greatest quarterback we’ve ever seen is still to be determined, since he’s only 28, but he probably has better Plans C and D than anybody else ever has, and he isn’t exactly working with the Greatest Show on Turf these days.

But Shanahan also brought up the Third Possession, which is unrelated to the Fourth Turning or the Fifth Dimension but made perfect sense upon further review.

Shanahan was counting on the teams being tied after each possession. By taking the ball first, he was in line to get the Third Possession. Under the new rules, the OT goes back to sudden-death at that point, which meant the 49ers could end the game on a field goal or touchdown. That’s why it would have been coaching malpractice if Shanahan hadn’t taken the ball. It’s also why the Kansas City players said they were prepared to go for two, after a touchdown on its first possession, had the 49ers scored a touchdown first.

However, it still wouldn’t have worked for Shanahan because the two possessions lasted so long. San Francisco took 13 plays to get to its field goal, and Hardman’s touchdown was Kansas City’s 13th play of that drive. So Hardman’s score came with :03 left in the overtime period. The Chiefs similarly cut it close on Harrison Butker’s field goal at the end of regulation. And to think Philadelphians were happy to be done with Andy Reid, mainly because of (all together now) poor clock management.

Had the 15-minute overtime period ended in a tie, there would have been another coin toss before the next one.

Shanahan thus falls to 0-2 in Super Bowls as a head coach and 0-1 as a coordinator. Two more losses in the big one and he’ll be able to go into the Hall of Fame like Bud Grant and Marv Levy, who went 0-4. But don’t make the 49ers think about the next one, not just yet. This one provides a lot of gaping wounds for the 49ers to lick, particularly since they couldn’t have asked for better Super Bowls from Christian McCaffrey and Brock Purdy.

As for the rocket ship known as the NFL, Roger Goodell might go for the ratings jugular and schedule a Super Bowl on the moon, if for no other reason than to let Mahomes jump over it.