Deebo Samuel will go off when 49ers face Cowboys in NFL playoffs

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What happens if 49ers beat Cowboys in Wild Card round? by Romelo Bracy

Matchup San Francisco 49ers 10-7 Dallas Cowboys 12-5 4:30 p.m. ET CBS Cowboys -3

Deebo Samuel might be the 49ers’ best overall offensive weapon in the NFL playoffs when they face off against the Cowboys in the Wild Card round.

If the Dallas Cowboys want to pull off a Wild Card win over the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday, they better have an answer for first-time first-team All-Pro wide receiver Deebo Samuel.

Samuel has been nothing short of insane this season, notching an incredible 1,770 all-purpose yards and team-best 14 touchdowns on the year, even passing for one more during the Niners’ thrilling Week 18 win over the Los Angeles Rams.

In short, Dallas has to be overly concerned with just how many ways head coach Kyle Shanahan uses the third-year pro on offense.

True, the Cowboys defense has enjoyed a massive turnaround under defensive coordinator Dan Quinn this season, and key playmakers like linebacker Micah Parsons and cornerback Trevon Diggs have been crucial, too.

But, there are plenty of reasons to suspect Samuel going off once more when these two teams square off for a highly anticipated NFL playoffs bout on Sunday.

Deebo Samuel can torch Cowboys defense as a runner

Dallas is already suspect against the run during the regular season, giving up an average of 4.5 yards per carry, which ranks 23rd in the league over 18 weeks.

This plays right into San Francisco’s perceived game plan of running the ball a lot, both to control the time of possession and to take advantage of the Cowboys’ over-aggressive pass-rushing abilities.

Samuel, in particular, might be prone to getting to the outside where Dallas isn’t as poised to execute its run defense quite as well.

For all the talk surrounding Diggs, who has been exceptionable at forcing turnovers this season, he has been susceptible at missing tackles, especially defending against the run, and he has 10 already this season for a missed-tackle rate of 16.1 percent.

That’s high.

The 49ers shouldn’t shy away from running Samuel right at Diggs on Sunday.

49ers must have Deebo Samuel be a YAC monster vs. Cowboys

Both Samuel and the Niners are excellent at generating yards after the catch. The Cowboys aren’t good at limiting yards after the catch.

Advantage: San Francisco.

Samuel finished the regular season with the league’s second most yards after the catch (780), trailing only Los Angeles Rams wideout Cooper Kupp (846), and the 49ers as a team mustered 2,264 in YAC over the course of 2021, eighth best in the NFL.

On the flip side, Dallas surrendered 2,275 in YAC during the regular season, which ranked fourth highest across the league.

Read More: Jimmy Garoppolo can’t shoulder the whole load vs. Cowboys

Going back to Diggs, whose 11 interceptions and two defensive interceptions are surely impressive, he nevertheless gave up 411 yards after the catch, suggesting his defensive-coverage skills are of the “feast or famine” variety to a certain point.

It might not always be wise for quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo to target Diggs, namely because of the turnover concerns. But, based on Diggs’ tendency of giving up big plays if he’s not forcing a turnover, Garoppolo shouldn’t shy away from relying on Samuel if he’s lined up opposite Diggs anyway.

And if Samuel winds up having yet another one of those takeover-type games, there’s an excellent chance the Niners come out on top during Wild Card weekend, too.

Trent Williams, Deebo Samuel Earn First-Team All-Pro Honors

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Congrats are in order for two members of the San Francisco 49ers following the release of the Associated Press 2021 All-Pro list. Trent Williams and Deebo Samuel each earned first-team All-Pro honors for the first time in their careers, as determined by a vote of 50 media members of the Associated Press.

San Francisco’s left tackle closed out his second year in San Francisco as one of the top offensive linemen, if not top player, in the entire NFL in Year 12. According to football analytics site Pro Football Focus, Williams finished the year with an overall grade of 98.3, the highest ever given to any player in a season.

Williams was named an AP second-team All-Pro in 2015, yet, has never earned first-team honors despite being PFF’s highest-graded left tackle in 2013, 2016 and 2020. Williams tied for the most votes of any offensive lineman with 46. He was one of only 12 players to cross the 40-vote threshold.

Samuel is coming off of a standout performance in Year 3, where the wideout took significant strides while leading San Francisco’s pass catchers. He finished the year notching 1,770 yards from scrimmage and 14 total touchdowns (6 receiving and 8 rushing) on the year. His 14 total touchdowns are the most by a member of the 49ers since Terrell Owens had 14 touchdowns in 2002 (13 receiving and one rushing).

The third-year wideout becomes the first 49ers receiver to be voted onto the list since Owens in 2001. Samuel earned the third-most votes (21) in the receiver category behind Green Bay Packers Davante Adams (50) and Los Angeles Rams Cooper Kupp (50).

Deebo Samuel explains 49ers’ strategic ploy that set up trick-play TD

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INGLEWOOD – Deebo Samuel has added a new skill set to his résumé – playing quarterback.

Toward the end of the third quarter in the 49ers’ 27-24 overtime win over the Rams on Sunday, the multi-talented receiver took a handoff from Jimmy Garoppolo as he ran to the right. The Rams’ defense bit on the run, and then Samuel launched the ball 24 yards to Jauan Jennings for a touchdown pass.

Deebo can literally do everything 😱

pic.twitter.com/cEnTCUW7hH — 49ers on NBCS (@NBCS49ers) January 9, 2022

The touchdown tied the score after the 49ers had trailed 17-0 in the first half at SoFi Stadium. After the game, the wideout was proud of his handiwork.

“That was a seed, that was a dot,” Samuel said with a smile. “I really couldn’t see him at first, then I saw a little bit of white jersey and I just saw that he was back there alone, so I just threw it, even though I got smoked."

The TD pass was just a small part of Samuel’s stats in the 49ers’ comeback win. The Pro Bowl receiver caught four of his six targets for 95 yards, and carried the ball eight times for 45 yards and one score.

When Jennings was asked to rate Samuel’s throw, a huge smile crept across his face.

“Today, 10 out of 10,” Jennings said. “I’m just happy I caught it."

Samuel’s TD pass was the perfect end to a 11-play drive that started with 10 consecutive runs. The Rams’ defense, including cornerback Jalen Ramsey, was ready for Samuel to carry the ball since he’s been used as a running back for much of the season.

The pass stunned the Rams’ defense, which couldn’t recover. It was a long ploy by 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan to set up the trick play.

“It’s going to be hard to set it up more than that,” Shanahan said. “That is the hard thing to do. You run it 10 times in a row, that is when it is set up, but there is a risk, too. Why mess up a good thing? You’re running it pretty good right now. You always got to make that decision when you lead too long, and you end up with three points.”

Patience paid off for Shanahan and the 49ers’ offense, though, and they were right back in the game entering the fourth quarter.

“It kind of started early in the game,” Samuel said. “Kyle put an emphasis on getting around the edge, and you can see early on Jalen was the first one there when I would get around the edge. So we set it up and knew he was going to bite.

“When we got down in the red zone, Kyle said, ‘OK, you’re going to make the throw,’ and when I did, I made it happen."

The score was part of 17 unanswered points that gave the 49ers enough momentum to carry them into overtime and, ultimately, the wild-card round of the NFC playoffs.

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Deebo Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk DFS value for Wild Card Weekend

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The San Francisco 49ers are on a bit of a heater and head into the NFL playoffs with some top-tier offensive weapons. Two of this season’s top fantasy football surprises came from the 49ers’ offense in Deebo Samuel and Elijah Mitchell. But in terms of the WR position, what should we expect from Samuel and Brandon Aiyuk in DFS formats?

Deebo Samuel is electric

I was high on Samuel coming into the season, but even I didn’t expect that he would blow up and become the overall WR2 in half-PPR scoring. He’s been dynamic this season, operating as a top-tier wide receiver as well as a threat in the running game.

Samuel had the most receiving yards by a 49ers player in the last 20 years and was the only one to eclipse 1,400 receiving yards. His work on the ground was a new foil this season, and it made him nearly unstoppable in fantasy. Samuel is the only player in NFL history with 1,400+ receiving yards and 300+ rushing yards in a single season. His 365 rushing yards and 8 touchdowns on the ground made him an unbelievable asset.

Brandon Aiyuk had a disappointing second season

Many people had Aiyuk pegged for a second-season breakout after a promising rookie campaign. It never fully transpired, but it did get better as the season went on. Aiyuk was on the field for 90% or more of the offensive snaps in every game from Week 9 on. During that stretch, he averaged 68.5 receiving yards per game while adding 4 TDs. He was the WR13 over that stretch.

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Aiyuk turned the corner and provided meaningful value to fantasy managers. He saved his first 100-yard game of the year for Week 18 and caught 14 passes on 18 targets over the last three games, averaging 80.3 yards per game.

DFS expectations for Samuel and Aiyuk in the playoffs

The Niners have a first-round matchup with the Dallas Cowboys, and I personally believe that the wide receivers are in for a big day. The Cowboys’ defense has been opportunistic this season, but they’ve allowed the seventh-most receiving yards to opposing wide receivers. Contrarily, they’ve held opposing running backs to the fourth-fewest fantasy points per game.

San Francisco needs to involve their wide receivers, and Samuel and Aiyuk should be the chief benefactors. Samuel is $8,100 on DraftKings, with Aiyuk checking in much cheaper at $5,400. With Dallas’ ability to slow down opposing running games, Samuel’s upside might be more limited than we’ve seen. Therefore, Aiyuk profiles as a better play at his price.

Give Me Deebo Samuel Versus Micah Parsons or Give Me Boredom

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On Tuesday, I pointed to the quarterback matchup between Dak Prescott and Jimmy Garoppolo as the battle I’m watching closely in Sunday’s playoff game between Dallas and San Francisco. This was hardly original, but it is true insofar as what will have the greatest bearing on which team wins.

For entertainment value? My friends, there is much, much bigger game to hunt.

With respect to Garoppolo, a dark-haired brooding sort who is to quarterbacks as a Toyota Camry is to cars—functional, pragmatic, utterly boring, and perpetually replaceable—we are here to watch Deebo Samuel, the impeccably named pass catcher who spits in the face of positional designations. The 25-year-old is a wide receiver by trade, but as our Jake Kemp detailed yesterday, he’s a rather strange one: often living and dying with screen passes and yards after the catch. That’s before considering his 365 yards rushing this season, second-most on the team, on a whopping 6.2 yards per carry. And when things got hairy in last week’s win-to-get-in game versus the Rams, it was Samuel, not Garoppolo, who threw the game-tying touchdown pass late in the third quarter.

Deebo Samuel throws a touchdown pass to Jauan Jennings! #FTTB pic.twitter.com/QzhSWPXiOl — Pro Football Culture (@proftblculture) January 9, 2022

There is no one quite like him in football, which naturally makes him a rather unique problem for defenses to solve. Considering multiple media outlets have named him to their All-Pro teams, they’re not doing a very good job of it.

Of course, those other defenses do not employ Micah Parsons, the Cowboys’ shift-shifting generational talent. He continues to stump offensive coordinators because he has no analogue. What other 245-pounder blitzes, patrols the sidelines, and covers at the drop of a hat, sometimes all in the same series?

Odds are their interactions will be limited on Sunday. Samuel finished fifth in the NFL in receiving yards, which is the sort of production that will merit attention from Trevon Diggs or Anthony Brown far more often than Parsons. But when San Francisco gets funky with his positioning, sliding him around and behind the line of scrimmage to engineer mismatches, Dallas has a countermove unlike anyone else in the league.

Consider this my appeal for as many of those interactions as possible. Purists may romanticize Sunday’s matchup for its potential to devolve into an archetypal trench battle, which is all well and good, but I, an impatient millennial wired for spectacle and instant gratification, am not here for that. No, sir, I am tuning in to watch space-age, position-less football superweapons do battle all over the field. Gimme Samuel versus Parsons in the flats, down the sideline, up the seam—wherever. Show me Samuel trying to juke Parsons on a reverse as the latter screams downfield, and let Parsons flash his closing speed chasing after Samuel on a screen. Sprinkle in an open-field confrontation for the hell of it, just to see if Parsons can bring down one of the game’s slipperiest players. Any of that, and preferably all of it.

Will those moments have the most bearing on the game? Doubtful. But they might be the enduring ones for how they foreshadow where the game could one day go.