Run Game Coordinator/Offensive Line Chris Foerster Press Conference

Run Game Coordinator/Offensive Line Chris Foerster

Press Conference – October 24, 2024

San Francisco 49ers

What is the thought behind a protection that say protects the same side a quarterback is looking at with their hot read versus one that moves in the other direction?

“Protections are all kind of predicated upon, let’s say you have a back going to the right. Let’s say everybody’s getting out and the back’s going to check release. So, patterns are built with like three-man sides, two-man sides. So, if you want your back to go right, if the back’s going right, the line’s probably going to go left. So that there’s balance. And then if there’s overload of players to the back, and then you have a way that you can take care, there’s a lot of different ways to do it. That’s a very simplistic view of it. But truly every now and then you take a back on the left and you release them to the right. But the whole thing is there’s three-man and two-man parts because there’s five eligibles that can get out. Sometimes you leave more guys in, so you have balance, two by two routes. Sometimes you protect more like what was suggested a week ago when some of the play action passes that all of a sudden there’s maybe two or three-man routes and there’s more guys in. That’s what it is. So then where the line slides, where the hots are, a lot of times it’s built in two, four, then you take the two or three-man side. Where’s the best look when it is hot to throw the football based on the concept that’s called? So we have somebody in the flat or somebody quick. I’ve been doing this my whole life I focused on something else, but there’s just so many layers to it and then that predicates upon the protection. Then that predicate dictates the protection, what you want to do.”

What’s the timeline for OL Jon Feliciano? Is he after Bye?

“That’s up to [President of Football Operations/General Manager] John [Lynch] and [Head Coach] Kyle [Shanahan]. It’s because there’s so many decisions I think based on the total roster. So whether he’s ready to practice or not I’m not going to speak on his health and stuff like that. I think he’s progressed very well. And I would assume at some point this was about the timeline and somewhere in this area he’s going to be ready. It’s whether or not to open up the practice window based on how soon you can get him up and into the roster.”

How do you view him? He graded really highly last year. Is he a guy that could compete with OL Jake Brendel or OL Dominick Puni for their starting job or is he strictly a backup at this point?

“Well, I think Jon’s a luxury right now because [OL] Aaron [Banks], Dom and Jake are playing pretty good football. But doesn’t mean that if they stumble or if there’s a something the guy needs to be out for a little bit or whatever it is, Jon can step in and play. It gives us a great deal of flexibility and gives us a great deal of confidence in knowing that if we do have somebody that needs to be replaced or something happens, you definitely have somebody that can do it. And then, yeah, it’s always open. Shoot, somebody’s playing better or somebody’s struggling, you’re going to say, let’s give the other guy a shot.”

We’ve asked you a lot about the benefits of running a ball with a fullback out of 21 personnel. Are there any benefits to running the ball out of 11 personnel?

“Depends. For example, second half of the Saints game, basically from halftime on, it was a what I call a four-minute offense. They were up by so many points against Dallas that there was no sense for them to match nickel to 11 personnel so, they played base. Based on your tendency. So, it’s all predicated upon how they’re going to play you. 11 becomes a little bit more, the defense can dictate to you a little bit more. 21, 22, 12, you have a little more flexibility, regardless of what the defense does, you can still find a way to run the ball in an effective way. In 11, it’s kind of, ‘oh, well you can’t run there,’ so you got to run there, or you got to throw it. I go back to when I was in Indianapolis, we didn’t care. It’s like, fine, you want to play the run. We’ll throw it every snap with those great receivers and the quarterback. Oh, you want to play the run, then you know you’re going to play the pass. Well then, we got [Former NFL RB] Edgerrin James and we’re going to run against these very clean boxes because you’re going to defend the receivers that we had. So, it’s Catch 22, right? And then you’ve been other places where you say you don’t want to spend your game at 11 because if they say go ahead and throw it and you’re not as good at throwing it. And so whether it be a quarterback, receiver, whatever your situation is in that given team, that given year. So that’s the tradeoff. 11 is a little harder. It just depends. Like I said, sometimes it’d be easy because of your quarterback.”

Is T Trent Williams still the same Trent in your eyes after missing all of training camp? Some of these services, I know you guys don’t necessarily think a lot of Pro Football Focus, but they have him way up every year. Right now, he’s not nearly where he was.

“Yes, he’s fine. He’s been playing as well as he’s ever played. There might be some protections, but I thought it was the same as last year. And some things are actually better than a year ago. Who knows what it is? I don’t know their scales, at least it’s consistent. So, whatever they grade him as and however they do it, I’m not there to discuss theirs. But I know that definitely, from our perspective, to me, he’s playing the same as he played a year ago. Is that best? I’m not doing that, but I do know he’s playing almost exactly the same as he played a year ago. And it was funny because he missed camp. It kind of bothers me.”

You guys around here haven’t relied on rookie classes much at all to have to contribute in recent years. This year, obviously for a number of reasons that’s changed. Puni was kind of the first one in this class to. I know you’ve talked a lot about his willingness and readiness coming in. Do you sense in him, like setting an example for some of these other rookies? Some of the other guys have decided ‘Hey, Puni showed us immediately, there’s no red shirting around here. This is what we can do.’ Did you kind of get the sense of he is a guy who sets a tone for that rookie class?

“Well, he just shows that we’re not going to play favorites. In other words, it’s just because you’ve been here, if you’re the best player, you’re going to play. If you play consistently in practice, you’re going to get a chance. Preseason, you’re going to get a chance. Games, you got a chance. And so, he proved that. Is he like the bell cow for ‘here’s how I do it, here’s what a rookie needs to do to play.’ No. But he does show that, ‘hey, if I do things and if I perform properly, I’m going to get to play.’ I was just talking with Dom this week. Dom’s still 24 years old. And I said, what are you doing on Tuesdays? Because it’s starting to get halfway through the season. I want to say, ‘what are you doing to take care of yourself during the season?’ He goes, ‘well really coach. I’m a little sore on Monday, but after we lift and I throw the weight around a little bit, I’m fine.’ I mean, that’s not normal, but that’s a 24-year-old rookie that hasn’t played a lot of NFL football. And that’s why I said, you need to start a routine. Come in here and no more than stretching, no more than hot tub, cold tub, no more than whatever it is on a Tuesday. Get a routine going instead of saying, ‘I feel great on Monday. I’m going to go sit around all day Tuesday and play video games and then come back ready for practice on Wednesday.’ Get a routine that’s going to be sustainable because he is a good player. But as he learned already that good play, those holes that I said last week, they start showing up. Now he’s done a nice job of fixing some of the problems that’s been starting to surface because he’s really good about correcting his mistakes. But there’s stuff that’s going to come up and if you don’t come in, extra film work, eventually it piles up because the great players are going to do it. The great players are going to have a routine and that routine as you do one-year, two-year, three-year, four-year, five-year, all of a sudden you start banking reps above the guy that decides not to do extra work. And I’ve seen players whose careers I’ve set up, but they just fall off the end of the podium here because they haven’t done the offseason work. So when they hit the wall, it’s a hard wall. Whereas opposed to a guy that’s taking care of himself every single day, can get the very, very most out of his career. And that’s what you try to set that tone now at 24-years old with him. But it’s a long answer like I always give to a short question, but the guy definitely does show the rookies. And our rookie class, a lot of guys are contributing and doing a heck of a job.”

You mentioned those holes. How is he at kind of self-identifying those things? So when you bring things to him, things that he may already have recognized?

“Well, like I said to you earlier, he’s a good football player that I said him, why are you like this Dom? He goes I’ve been playing football since I was seven. And he recognizes for example, he knows he does something wrong. He’s like, ‘oh, that was that.’ He does. He knows. To fix it, we have to talk about how are you’re going to fix it because obviously he knows it’s wrong, but he keeps doing it. So how can I help you to fix it a little bit? What can you focus on to fix it? That’s a good thing about him. He’s diligent about getting those things fixed.”

What’s the verdict on Puni versus Kansas City Chiefs DL Chris Jones? I know that they didn’t get a ton of one-on-ones? Was that by design?

“Yeah, you don’t want to leave. I mentioned it last week. The question was asked, where does he rank with [Former DL] Reggie White and [Former DL] Bruce Smith and those guys like that. I am old enough to have coached against. I don’t think we had a lot of one-on-ones. Banks had one and he got beat. I don’t remember Dom having, he might’ve on a three step at one point. I don’t remember off the top of my head. I don’t think he did. I don’t know what his stat line was. I would assume they did a pretty good job as far as sack pressures. Yeah, it was by design. Kyle does a really good job at designing that stuff. And the guys executed. We did a good job with it and got to keep working, but yeah not the result we wanted.”

You guys have been struggling running it, I saw that RB Jordan Mason’s got seven carries for one yard down there. What is the film showing? Are you guys not moving people? Are you getting out quick? Is the running back dancing?

“It’s like in anything and then in five more carries we could say it’s five touchdowns and averaging four. It can flip like that. It’s a sample size. I said before, we haven’t good enough down there. It’s a little bit everything, sometimes it’s a missed block, sometimes it’s a missed cut. Sometimes it’s a bad defense. Sometimes it’s an unscouted look. Sometimes, it is what it is. I looked again, I was watching today. Every week I watch every run in the league from the 10-yard line in. They compile this cut up and I just study 60, 70 plays just to see what other people are doing. How are other people getting involved in the end zone? Are they getting any better success running the ball down there. Just ideas, you just steal from other people or see something that’s a good idea. I watched the one against where he got the fumble against Arizona, and he could’ve easily just stuck that ball inside. Did he have a read to go out? It was probably a bounce read and at the end of the day he’s got to hold on the football, but if he went inside, he would’ve had probably about a five-yard gain. He wouldn’t have scored because he’s got the free safety. But did he make the right move? You’re nitpicking here. You know what I’m saying? So on that sample size, we just have to continue to program or to have on the game plan good calls. We had a good call last week. We ran one that Mase took us down inside the five. It was a nice gain. Wherever the negatives have been, it’s got more because it went for about five or six down there and did a heck of a job on it. It was a well blocked play. And it was a well thought out and well executed play. But you win some, you lose some. It’s not always good. And we do have to keep working to improve down there. But again, I say we’ve had a lot of success. So it is that trade off of, ‘okay, this is who we are and this is what we do. At what point is it taken away or at what point is it, they really decided to defend it, we need to do other things or at what point is it, we’re still not executing.’ So we’re still feeling through that. We got another half of the season to go. I think we’ve been improving on it every week. I think we’ve had a little more production, not maybe running it in, but it’s been more productive”

I think it was a third and 11 in the first half, and they had two guys unblocked. What happened on that play? There were two guys on their edge and their DB.

“Oh, yeah. They brought a look that they tied up. We were balanced. They brought a guy over the right guard, a guy over the right tackle. They slide down and two guys off the edge. And we were in a five-man protection, so we weren’t sliding right or sliding left. Everybody had a man on. It was an odd front. And they brought two guys outside. When they brought the guy over the guard, we had no chance to get out. If they wouldn’t have brought the guy with the guard, we would’ve picked up one of the two. We would’ve picked up the end and one more, but there still would’ve been the widest guy. So when the two came free, that was the design. It was a good blitz, five-man protection, we could only block the five guys. So unless we would’ve double counted or maybe done something to see what they were bringing, we’ll just change the protection and go that way. It would’ve been really hard to pick up. It was a good design by [Kansas City Chiefs Defensive Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo] Spags and they did a good job on that overall.”