San Francisco 49ers: After Loss to Oakland Raiders, the Season Is Finished

For the second week in a row, the San Francisco 49ers put up an embarrassing performance.  Last week, it was a humiliation at the hands of the Seattle Seahawks.  This week, the 49ers looked sluggish, groggy and unprepared to handle the previously one-win Oakland Raiders.  The end result?  An ugly, embarrassing 24-13 loss.

The season is not mathematically over—the 49ers could still get to 10 wins, which is likely to get them into the playoffs.  It is also not probabilistically over, if you ignore opponents—the 49ers have put together two separate three-game winning streaks this season to go along with their three two-game losing streaks.

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However, let’s be realistic here for a moment.  This 49ers team just lost to the 2-11 Oakland Raiders—a team coming off of the worst loss in franchise history.  This is a team whose season is mathematically over, and has been for weeks.

We’re supposed to believe the 49ers are going to turn around and beat the Seattle Seahawks next week in Seattle?  Or that they’ll ride through that and then beat the dangerous San Diego Chargers, and then knock off the Arizona Cardinals at home the week after?  Because that’s what it would take for this team to go anywhere in 2014, and that’s just straining belief.

The 49ers didn’t have to win out to make the playoffs, but no realistic scenario involved this.  It’s bad enough that the 49ers were mathematically eliminated from the NFC West with the wins by Seattle and Arizona, but to actually lose to Oakland?  That is, and should be, embarrassing for a team that believed itself to be a playoff contender.

Full credit to the Oakland Raiders, by the by.  They pretty clearly wanted this victory more, which should be highly disappointing to 49ers fans.  The Raiders actually would have been better off losing this matchup, but still, playing for nothing but pride, they knocked off their second playoff contender of the year.

So that brings us to what do for the rest of the 2014 season.  The team has imploded over the past two weeks, and are watching their hopes going up in a flaming wreck.  It feels, at this point, like this window of 49ers teams are going to be up there with the early ‘90s Buffalo Bills and the 2000s Philadelphia Eagles—teams that were so good for so long, but could never get it done.  With the rumors intensifying that Jim Harbaugh will be leaving the team next season—a move I still feel would be a mistake—what on earth does the 49ers organization do over the next three weeks?

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While I saw a bit of a movement to get rid of Harbaugh this week on Twitter after the game, I don’t think that is a responsible action.  What might be a move they could make right now, however, would be to fire Greg Roman, the offensive coordinator.

The 49ers have been held to only 412 yards of offense in the past two weeks, barely over 200 yards per game.  That’s now three games where the 49ers have been held under 300 yards of offense.  That’s not quite Minnesota Vikings or Oakland Raiders territory, but it’s far from ideal.  There is too much talent on this offensive roster to be putting up these kinds of performances.

It’s somewhat excusable against Seattle, which boasts a ferocious defense.  Against the Raiders, however?  The 2014 Raiders' previous low in yards allowed was 297, to the New England Patriots in Week 3.  The 49ers’ 248 yards shatters that—an embarrassing performance against one of the worst defenses in the NFL.

This is not the first time Roman’s offense has underperformed, and it’s not all Roman’s fault.  Colin Kaepernick had a second bad game in a row, and the pass blocking was horrendous.  The team can’t get rid of Kaepernick at this point, however, due to his contract—it would create almost $10 million in dead money in 2015, according to Spotrac.  Nor should they get rid of Kaepernick at this point—the past two games have been very bad, but looking at the season as a whole, he has shown signs of improvement.

LM Otero/Associated Press

If you’re looking for a scapegoat, then, you’re probably looking squarely at Greg Roman.  In his four years as 49ers offensive coordinator, the 49ers have ranked 26th, 11th, 24th and now 22nd in terms of yards.  Some of the lack of yardage is due to the superior field position provided by their excellent defense, but that’s an advantage they haven’t had this season.

The 49ers’ average starting line of scrimmage this year, entering this week, was the 27-yard-line, firmly in the middle of the pack.  Last year, it was the 33-yard-line, and the year before, the 31-yard-line.  The 49ers have been pinned deeper back this year, requiring more from their offense, and they’ve been unable to rise to the challenge.  I’d put that squarely on the shoulders of the offensive coaching staff.

To be clear, I don’t know what I would do if I were the 49ers’ brass.  This is partially because I don’t fully understand their apparent desire to fire Jim Harbaugh after one poor season.  Bill Belichick’s Patriots missed the playoffs in 2002, and he got to stay.  If it’s simply because of personality clashes between general manager Trent Baalke and the head coach, the solution seems to be to hire someone to serve as a go-between, much like Carmen Policy served in the Eddie DeBartolo years, not to fire a coach who has led the franchise to three NFC Championship Games after years in the NFL wasteland.

But I think either way, that’s a decision for the offseason.  There are more pragmatic decisions to be made for the rest of the season.  Primarily, now I think there’s no reason to bring NaVorro Bowman back this season.  Shut him down and let him rest up entirely for the 2015 season.  The same with Glenn Dorsey—there’s no reason to risk him aggravating his injury.

Marcio Jose Sanchez/Associated Press

I’d also like to see some of the younger players playing more snaps.  I want to see Aaron Lynch and Aldon Smith starting at the outside linebacker positions, especially considering Ahmad Brooks was benched for missing a team meeting this week.  I want to see Bruce Ellington and Carlos Hyde getting more offensive snaps, and Quinton Patton and Tank Carradine being active and involved.

Most importantly, I want the team to look like they are preparing for the future, not flailing around with the probably lost 2014 season.  You can’t entirely revamp an offense during the season, of course, but you can begin to make steps.  If that includes switching offensive coordinators midstream, then that’s what needs to happen.

Either way, after Sunday’s performance, only the most optimistic of 49ers fans would think they could be playoff-bound.  They have, maybe, a 10 percent chance of making it from here on out, and I think even that number is optimistic.  You would have needed something to happen as an upset—the Bears beating the Cowboys, the Chiefs beating the Cardinals, the Eagles beating the Seahawks or the Buccaneers beating the Lions.  With no help coming from inside the club, and no help coming from outside, the season’s over.

If the franchise really is in good hands, they’ll start making decisions for 2015 sooner rather than later.  It doesn’t necessarily have to come with big personnel moves, but a clear and visible change in offensive philosophy is needed.

For those keeping track, the 49ers will be mathematically eliminated from the playoffs next week if they lose to Seattle, Detroit beats Minnesota and Green Bay beats either Atlanta or Buffalo.  For all practical purposes, however, they're already done for the year.

Bryan Knowles is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report, covering the San Francisco 49ers.  Follow him @BryKno on Twitter.