No Matter Who Wins, the NFC Championship is Poetry
Coming into the 2021 NFL season, both the 49ers and Rams both had lofty aspirations. The Rams felt they had high level (and high priced) talent at just about every key area of the field, and that they would be able to go toe to toe with any team in the league. The 49ers felt that the 2020 season was a fluke, ruined by high ankle sprains and torn ACLs, and that they had the roster necessary to return to the Super Bowl and finish the job they’d started in 2019.
Much of the offseason intrigue for each team centered around the QB position. LA had doubled down on their “never pick in the first round” draft strategy by sending 2 first round picks to the Detroit Lions for quarterback Matthew Stafford. Rams’ brass had clearly decided the main factor holding the team back was QB Jared Goff’s penchant for throwing the ball to the other team, or into the ground, or basically anywhere else except into the hands of one of the Rams’ offensive weapons. They needed a high level NFL QB and they did whatever they had to do to land one. They were clearly Super Bowl or bust.
The 49ers meanwhile, having sniffed around veteran QB options like Stafford and Aaron Rodgers on the trade market, had decided to stick with Jimmy Garoppolo while simultaneously sending three first round picks of their own to Miami to trade up for his eventual replacement, Trey Lance. While the Jimmy G vs Trey Lance wars raged on Twitter, the 49ers quietly remained resolute in their belief that steady veteran QB play from Garoppolo, paired with what they saw as an elite roster, could guide them back to the NFL’s mountaintop.
By the time the two teams met for the first time in week 10 this season, one team’s plan seemed to be working perfectly, while the other’s decidedly was not.
Aside from an ugly loss to the Titans the week before, the Rams had looked every bit a Super Bowl contender over their first 9 games. They’d raced out to a 7–2 start, Stafford was getting some early MVP buzz, and they’d tripled down on their aforementioned strategy by trading for 4 time all-pro linebacker Von Miller and signing Odell Beckam Jr, both of whom were set to make their debuts against the 49ers.
The 49ers on the other hand, were mired at 3–5 and seemed totally lost. Fresh off maybe the most embarrassing loss of the Shanahan era to the Colt McCoy led Arizona Cardinals the week before, the Niners looked like a team trapped between past and present, a far cry from the physical and swaggering bunch that had bullied their way to Super Bowl LIV. Aside from Deebo Samuel morphing into a mini Godzilla, there wasn’t much for fans to get excited about. The Garoppolo Wars had reached a fever pitch, and some fans (the dumb ones) were even calling for Shanahan and/or GM John Lynch’s head. While 49ers twitter was maybe acting a tad hysterical, the team did look downright mediocre, and the season outlook looked grim.
It will be the Week 18 game in LA that 49er fans’ will remember when thinking about the 2021 regular season, and for good reason, but the turning point for the team came back in that week 10 game, at Levi’s Stadium on Monday Night Football. Their offensive line bullied the vaunted Rams front, churning out consistent chunks of yardage on the ground, while Garoppolo helped neutralize the LA pass rush with an accurate and efficient short passing game. This was also the game in which Kyle Shanahan realized that Samuel, already the team’s best wide receiver, was also probably their best running back. He rushed 5 times for 36 yards and a touchdown that night, starting a streak of 5 consecutive games in which he’d score a rushing touchdown. On the defensive side of the ball, the 49ers were all over the field, picking off Stafford twice in the first quarter and pestering him all night to hold the Rams’ powerful offense to just 10 points. All of a sudden the 49ers looked like the team that steamrolled their way to an NFC title just 2 years prior, dominating the Rams en route to a 31–10 victory on national TV. It was the 5th time in a row Shanahan’s 49ers had beat Sean McVay’s Rams, and for the first time in a while, the Faithful had reason to hope.
By the time the two teams met again in week 18, San Francisco had won 6 of their last 8, and was in the 6th spot in the NFC playoff standings. A 6th straight victory over the Rams would punch their ticket to the playoffs and complete a stunning turnaround over the back half of the season. But after the Ram’s jumped out to a 17 point first half lead, and with the Saints comfortably beating the hapless Falcons, it appeared as if that turnaround would be for naught and the Niners would be on the next flight to Cancun. You probably know what happened next. Deebo Samuel threw a touchdown pass. Second year receiver Juan Jennings made clutch catch after clutch catch. Jimmy Garoppolo led the offense down the field with no timeouts and barely a minute left to tie a game in which, minutes before, they’d had the lowest win probability of any eventual winner since people started saying the words “win probability.” Robbie Gould kicked the winning field goal in overtime and Sean McVay lost for the first time ever when leading at halftime. For the sixth straight time, the 49ers beat the Rams.
But as it turns out that was merely an appetizer. Here we are a few weeks later, with the stakes somehow even higher. The Rams stomped fellow NFC West rivals Arizona in the wild card round before surviving another absurd comeback attempt in Tampa Bay to reach the NFC Championship Game. Who do they get to face as their reward? Of course it’s the 49ers. Shanahan’s group has every reason to believe they are a team of destiny given the run they are on. After the impossible comeback in LA, they strutted into Jerry World and beat the Cowboys, then marched on to frigid Lambeau Field and somehow skated out with a win without even scoring an offensive touchdown. No one expected them to be here. They are playing with house money and you better believe their confidence is sky high. You think they are happy to play a team they’ve beaten 6 times in a row for the chance to play in the Super Bowl? That is why this year’s NFC Championship Game is the ultimate sporting drama. No matter who wins, the storyline is pure poetry.
For the Rams, this is a chance to exorcise their ultimate demon. For the last 3 years, the 49ers have owned the Rams. They’ve beaten them with Jimmy Garoppolo, they’ve beaten them with Nick Mullens. They’ve blown them out and they’ve edged past them at the final whistle. This week, McVay has been forced to answer whether Shanahan is “in his head” in his press conferences. There was so much red in SoFi Stadium in week 18 that 49er fans have taken to calling SoFi “Levi’s South.” And most importantly, the Niners wouldn’t even be here if the Rams had simply handled their business in the regular season. This is a monster of LA’s own creation, it’s only fitting that it’s the exact one they have to slay in order to earn a shot at glory.
Imagine an LA win. The 6 game losing streak suddenly means nothing. The Deebo Samuel/Aaron Donald memes are powerless. Week 18 becomes nothing but a footnote in their ride to the Super Bowl. It’s a story we’ve all seen a million times: the hero gets beaten and knocked down time and time again before rising to the challenge and defeating their mortal enemy in a final life or death battle. There is no opponent the Rams could vanquish this week that could possibly be more meaningful, no victory more cathartic than this one.
The poem of a 49ers victory is a different one, but is no less an epic. Besieged by doubters at every turn, San Francisco’s path has been a lonely one. Fans and media alike questioned their decision to stick with Garoppolo last summer, and for a good part of the season those questions seemed more than valid. But despite his obvious limitations as a passer, it’s clear to anyone who has followed this team closely how central Garoppolo has been to their recent success. Given the trials this team faced early on, it would have been entirely reasonable for them to fold, coast through the season, and look towards the Trey Lance era. But that did not happen. Instead, they rallied around Garoppolo and have found different ways to win football games over and over again. Garoppolo is clearly the least talented of the four remaining QBs, but he is also clearly beloved by his locker room, and it is no question that this likely being his last ride with this group has served as an intangible motivating factor behind the team’s surge to the NFL’s final four. Perhaps no quote sums up the close-knit team spirit that has come to define this year’s 49ers, including their feelings on Garoppolo, than the one by Divisional Round hero Jordan Willis this week.
Yes, this poem is familiar too. It’s the tale of the underdog, counted out by everyone but themselves, and persevering anyway. They’ve beaten the Rams six times in a row, yet they remain underdogs. It was against LA that they finally rediscovered their identity, and it was against LA that they punched their ticket to the tournament against all odds. It’s only fitting that they must once again face their flashy southern neighbors with more on the line than ever.
Consider a 49ers win. They’ll have beaten the Rams in their house twice within a month, with impossibly high stakes. They can simply leave their jerseys hanging in the locker room in preparation for the Super Bowl to be played at SoFi in another two weeks’ time. To get to the Super Bowl by beating that team, in that building, after these last three years of domination? All with a lame duck quarterback? Those bragging rights don’t go away for a while. Hell, should the 49ers go on to win the Super Bowl in that very same stadium I think SoFi might actually be required to hand the sponsorship rights over to Levi’s.
Of course, the stakes are always high once you are at this point in the season. This is where legacies are won or lost, and single plays can be burned into the cultural consciousness for generations. It’s just rare to see two teams that are so closely entwined, who both took such unique and compelling paths to this point, reach glory’s doorstep at just the same time. Of course, only one can move on. If you’re not a fan of either team, try to appreciate this for what it is, poetry. If–like me–you are a fan, well… you better just hope that it’s not a tragedy.
