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Mike Sando’s keys to success for the 2019 San Francisco 49ers

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Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

On Thursday morning, Mike Sando, senior NFL writer for The Athletic, appeared on the Murph & Mac show to discuss the upcoming 49ers season. With an unproven quarterback and a revamped defense it’s hard to predict what we’ll see from the 49ers this year. Sando gave what he sees as realistic goals for the team’s 2019 season.

Of the highest priority, Sando claims, is to break the four-year streak of losing records.

“Let’s be at least a .500 team, how about that? Let’s get to .500. It seems like the optimism that’s been there and the talk of ‘We’re gonna build a championship program’ and all this stuff. Let’s just baby step. Let’s be a good team, let’s not be a bad team before we can be a good team, you know what I mean? So I would like to see that, I’d like to see the young firepower on defense come together: not be great, but at least be middle of the pack.”

That said, Sando does not see a .500 record as the 49ers’ ceiling. When asked about the possibility of playoffs, Sando explains “I don’t think that’s a totally unattainable goal at all. We see teams all the time win nine games. If you have the health of your quarterback the whole year, we’ve seen them win some games with Garoppolo. I think you’d feel better about it.”

This transitions into Sando’s next goal for the 2019 season: Improved durability and efficiency for Jimmy Garoppolo.

“You want to see Garoppolo, let’s say, start at least 14 games or something like that. And then I think you feel good about it. You’ll be a lot better off.” Additionally, Sando highlights the 49ers’ mediocre aerial efficiency over the past couple seasons, specifically mentioning Garoppolo’s TD-INT ratio in his eight starts as the 49er signal-caller.

“Eleven touchdowns, eight interceptions doesn’t look good. I think his other numbers are really good, so I wouldn’t overrate the interceptions, but I would like to see that sort of shift out, too and just not give it to the other team. Don’t put your defense in bad spots because you got to help those guys out. They got to help you out. It’s a team game: everything together. And the focus is all on Garoppolo, but you got to have the right sort of formulas of how you play the games.”

Sando continues his interview by transferring emphasis to the defensive line. “The key defensively is just ‘is the pass-rush viable?’ And if it is, a lot of things will fall into place.” Sando believes getting newcomers Bosa and Ford synchronized with an already talented defensive line will prove vital for keeping the entirety of pressure off Garoppolo and the offense.

Overall, Sando echos the “brick by brick” mentality that GM John Lynch and Coach Shanahan have installed, claiming baby-steps are the practical way back to success, but believes with consistent quarterback play and a fierce pass-rush, the 49ers may very well find themselves in the postseason come January.