Kyle Shanahan Shares Game Plan for Playing Starters in Week 18 | Press Pass

Alright. Injuries for today, Armstead won't practice, Christian McCaffrey won't practice.

Ross Dwell he won't practice.

John Feliciano won't with back, Ambrey with surgery, had Elijah Mitchell won't practice he's sick. Gibson has a quad he won't practice.

Jay R. Brown knee won't practice.

Juwan Jennings and jay Len Moore both limited with their concussions from Costco and Aaron Banks and Danny or full go ahead, Kyle.

Do you plan on playing brock Perdy against the Rams?

No?

Brox Ony guy for sure. No, I don't plan on playing.

What went him to that decision?

One? You only can you can rest seven guys if nobody's hurt, if you get two practice squad guys up.

We have at least six guys.

Injured right now, so there's only I know for sure we can rest one and someone with their starting quarterback.

Any thought to play Brandon Allen as well as.

Not right now?

I mean he'll be ready, he'll get some work in the week, But going like a sam right now?

Chemistry wise, is this a tricky thing?

Because you've got a bunch of guys, you can't rest everybody has just said.

And some guys have injuries, some guys don't.

Some guys are more important to your plan. How do you negotiate that in people so you don't have bad feelings.

In your room?

You explain everyone that it's not an option, and you explain to them why, so they get that. And it's pretty easy to understand when you got to dress forty eight people, so you only can pick five, and you have more than five guys injured, So I already the guys who are injured are already not planned. So how many other guys you get a pick? I can pick two up from practice squad.

But that's all.

So unless we start cutting a bunch of players, there's no other option.

So guy's got to be in uniform. They've got to be ready to go.

It's nice with Brock because he can still be in a uniform and not count because he can be the third quarterback, which that happened. Will decide whether to put them in unif we're not going and handed off if that happened. But you just got explained it to the guys.

And also.

It's you know, you work hard to get an off.

Week in this league.

I think off week helps a lot of people, especially if you handle it the right way and stuff, and just this time of year and allows guys to get a little fresher and stuff, which which you don't want is two off weeks. No one gets two by weeks. And we earned ours next week. We just didn't know we were going to do it already, so we got to make sure we get something out of this week.

And we've been in this situation before.

Where we earned it by week was in twenty nineteen, but we didn't know we earned that until about eight thirty at night on the last play of the game vers Seattle. It was the first time it hit us when to play. Before that, we might have been playing that Saturday. So we were very thankful we earned it. That we need that rest and we got it that week. Yes, we're in that situation, but we already know we're there, and so that's why guys, mind's got to be right

You more willing to live with the chance that someone could get hurt who's very important to you, or the possibility that your team would be too rusty and not ready for that first game.

It's not about the rusty, It's about one how you pull off a game. You Rusty isn't always about the game. Rusty is how you treat the week, and the game is how how you treat the week. It's games three and a half hours of to me what unfolded throughout the week, and then you just get to cut it loose so that you got to play accordingly. You got to watch how.

The game's going and be as smart as you can.

I also think people win in playoff games because you're a team. Yes, good players put you over the hump and everything, but you want to rest a good player, go watch what happens to all the other role players.

You lose your whole role players.

Before you go to a playoff and you just depend on your quote unquote good players, there'll be a lot of trouble there too. So it's I mean, it is what it is. I mean, our goal is to get better this week. Are also goal is to not have anyone injured, which we're gonna but it's both of those are at risk. We're gonna work our hardest to do it. But resting the obvious ones sometimes it can be the reason you lose, because you lose all guys that you

Rount this week, Brock, I mean, we're treating this is a normal week.

So this is a normal Wednesday at this time of year, which means we go half speed on everything. We don't do anything full speed this time of year. On a windsay the Brock will get half of the reps with the one Sam will get the other. I want our team to treat this week as Brock going down on like the first play of the game. Now, that's why I want him both repping it. I want Brock to get some work this week, and that's something I'd like

Oh I, I did truly comprehend everything you said.

I'm sure.

Might it be good for thirty five year old left tackles too?

Two bye weeks?

Uh No, I don't think it's good for anybody to take two weeks off, So not at all. Let you see how Trent was and it came back after a month off or three weeks. It's it's not good. But we'll see how the game goes and everything. But his mindset this week's got to be that he's getting ready to play.

It's obviously the amount of players that you have as opposed to what you have in the preseason and the way you're approaching this game. It's dramatically different. But in terms of the game plan part of it and what you're gonna put in and use without evolting anything. Is that preseason like.

I mean, yeah, it's there's a good chance for playing this team in two weeks, So I think both sides will be a pretty vanilla on that. I'd be surprised that there's too much stuff. But we also know each other pretty well, both teams and the schemes, and when we play each other, I don't think a lot goes into that anyways. That's but every game affects the next game, So I'm gonna be smart how we do everything.

You're not really preparing for the Rams, but how have they improved as the season's gone.

Or preparing for the RAMS big time? We could see how good they could be in Week two. Anytime that you have a quarterback like Matt Stafford, who is as good as anyone that I've ever studied, And anytime you have that, you always have a chance. I mean, he's always guy. But where they've improved the most is how much their run game's going. It's as good as any run game in this league. You put those together with

And when you have a.

Generational playoffs there with Aaron Donald with what they're doing on the other side, that gives them a chance to be just as dangerous as anyone in this league.

Obviously, you're happy to have the one seed, but this balancing rest who plays how much one of the harder things you do with this couch.

I mean, it's it's just different.

I mean, harder is when everybody's hurt and you don't feel like it's gonna be really hard when you watch that tape.

To figure out how to win. So I'd say those are the worst.

This is just different stuff that you think it's gonna be one way because you haven't totally thought through all of that, and then once you really sit down and think about it, you realize that's not really at all what people think it can be. I mean, I want to try to do everything as much as anybody thinks we should, but then when you really think about all the things that connect, it's it's not that simple. And this is what I got to make sure is this

How much the forty eight guys you shoot up?

How many can you get by with playing in a game?

Is it forty thirty eight?

Have you thought about that?

Yeah? And which one of those guys got hurt?

That's why there's no absolute and you can get by with twenty two if I'd say one out of one hundred times a thousand times. But I mean, like it just all depends how something plays out. I mean, it was until a couple of years ago they allowed an EIGHTHO alignment to get up, and if they wouldn't have had that new rule, we would have done our last three series of Baltimore with Charlie Warner playing tackle.

So I mean that stuff happens.

We went went twenty years without having to play a third quarterback, and then all of a.

Sudden it happened an NFC championship game.

So you know, when we were in Atlanta, we went all year only dressing two running backs and and then hurt till the Super Bowl when we lost seven for the whole game and DeVante was hurt. So like, it's it's all risk, and that's stuff you got to balance out, and that stuff you got to be ready to see how it goes.

But it's man.

You you got five receivers up, you want to sit a couple, Well, how do you get practice squad guys up?

You can get two?

We also have a corner down at the Ambry had surgery. We had Gip who probably won't be able to go with.

This guy Eric Harris is out of practice squad, so get another. Were already down a logan Ryan sod You go with.

Three safeties or do you cut people to get up an extra practice squad guy receiver Christian probably not gonna be able to go, isn't So you would go with two backs in that situation and just ride one? Or do we flex one of those practice squads and go with one less safety and one less corner and only have three or four there, which maybe could work unless someone gets a cramp.

You know, it's it's everything.

So it's I want to waste your guys time learning it, just like I don't. I don't waste my time learning all the injury names for Eric. But it's it's not easy.

There's a motion you do mostly with Christians, sometimes with other guys. It's kind of like a shuffle to the side that looks. I don't think a lot of other teams in the league do it. What are sort of the benefits of that motion where he sort of might end up in a weird position behind the line, and what are the drawbacks?

Just watching how it moves the defense, getting people out of positions, watching people's adjustments, how they're going to treat it. I mean, when people haven't seen it before, then it's cool, but then they see you do it, so they they adjust to it, and you see what that does to people and does it help something and open up another But it's just about getting people to.

Move played this week is already concerned with him or felician additions.

Here, No, I mean get ended up.

I think we got yesterday he had a quad strain, so I mean that could be anywhere seven to ten days. So odds aren't I mean that can heal faster too, But just with our situation, the odds aren't there. And Feliciano new thing came up. But we feel pretty good about it. So we'll just see how the week goes out.

People have six returned to ir as nations left? Is that on purpose? I mean, did you guys resist putting some players on ir just so that you have a lot heading into.

The playoffs to use well.

Also, I mean last year we ran out of them, you know, you didn't. We didn't think we'd have them all, and then towards the end of the year we had to I think decide between Ridgeway and Jimmy, and we ended up losing Ridgeway because of that. So we wanted to make sure, I mean, we didn't want to do any just to do it. Sometimes you got to do it because it's close to that time and you got to help get other guys on your roster. But we didn't have as many of those situations this year, so

In a way.

Is this more stressful for you to coach a week like this than if you needed to in this game to clinch?

No?

Yeah, no, this is just stuff that's a little annoying to think about. But once you kind of do which you know, we had time to do that the last couple of days, and I just had to talk to some players so they understand it.

Then it's we're good, good, joyous.

Wait with Pro Bowl stuff coming out officially later today, can you kind of just put up perspect I mean, you're supposed to get a slew of guys probably today. I mean, you came into this this franchise and there were nine in twenty sixteen. Just how you and John have built this roster to this level.

I'm interesting.

It's been real cool that most of our Pro bowlers, I feel like, have come from here. You know, I know, you know we brought on Christian, you know, we brought in Trent. But it was just cool watching some of these guys who we'd go back and watch playoff games from twenty nineteen and stuff, and you just see rookies out there, second rookies with green Law and and and Debo, and second year player like with Fred, first year player

And in a year voting.

What makes Eric just so deserving for leadership on the field after.

Nominations just out he does it day in and day out, year around, Like I didn't even know about all this stuff till you know, I've been here long enough to where I gradually hear about it. And you know, he doesn't do it just for everyone to know about it. He does it because he has a.

Passion for it.

I know how you know, with where he's from being close to hear and how much he's held for that area. I know Eric truly loves it, is truly a great person in that way, and I know how much all of our team looks up to him in that way on kind of handle all social issues and just really how to be the best person you can.

All Right, Thanks guys,