One of the most intriguing moments of the season so far occurred on Monday night when the 49ers deployed a seven-man blitz against the Vikings late in the first half. Although the play almost resulted in an interception by cornerback Charvarius Ward, Vikings receiver Jordan Addison took the ball away from Ward and scored a 60-yard touchdown.
It was clear from the start that the lightning attack should not have been called. In that moment there was little to gain and much to lose. Chris Simms and I spent some time talking about this during PFT Live on Tuesday.
But the situation raised other questions, including the line between delegating and renouncing a head coach. Too often, coaches who specialize in offense leave the keys to defense to the coordinator and trust all decisions completely and completely to the defensive coach.
Others balked at our question about whether the head coach in such a case has a kill switch that can prevent the defensive coordinator from moving forward with a bad play.
On Wednesday, 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan shifted the public blame to defensive coordinator Steve Wilks and took none of it for himself. On Thursday, Wilks admitted it was a mistake. On Friday, Shanahan said to his credit: (1) He is ultimately responsible; and (2) he should have called a timeout to prevent the blitz.
“There was a timing issue that’s why we couldn’t make that call, and that’s undoubtedly my fault,” Shanahan told reporters. “I am the one who can stop this and that is why I bear ultimate responsibility for everything. But when I was asked about the call two days ago, he knew we couldn’t get it out of time and I screwed up not taking time out so we couldn’t do it. But I didn’t have a problem with the call in terms of what we’re doing. I love total flash. It’s just not something you can do at this point.”
This solves the problem. The head coach remains responsible, even if he delegates responsibility for defensive play direction. And the head coach has the power to prevent a bad game – provided he has at least one more timeout to do so.