What the 49ers said after losing to the Rams

The 49ers suffered a demoralizing 12-6 loss to the Los Angeles Rams on Thursday Night Football that effectively sealed their playoff fate.

According to the NFL’s Next Gen Stats, they have just a 0.1% chance of making the postseason. Linebacker De’Vondre Campbell didn’t wait around to see the final result — he quit in the third quarter.

They had the fewest yards of offense among all regular-season games in the Kyle Shanahan era, at 191. The only game with fewer was the NFC title game in January 2022, when Brock Purdy injured his elbow.

Purdy finished Thursday night with 142 yards on 14-of-31 passing in an off-and-on rainstorm. He had no touchdowns and his lone interception in the end zone ended a drive with the 49ers trailing 9-6 with 5:14 left in the game. The Niners only got the ball back again with 11 seconds to score.

Isaac Guerendo led the 49ers with 57 yards rushing on 16 carries, while George Kittle had 61 receiving yards, nearly double second-place Jauan Jennings (31 yards) on four receptions.

Deebo Samuel had a key drop and finished with three catches for 16 yards to go with two carries for three yards. He gave the Niners one last chance with a long kickoff return, but Purdy threw incomplete to Ricky Pearsall, then was sacked to end the game.

Here’s what the 49ers had to say after the loss:

Kyle Shanahan

On offensive struggles:

Not good enough. I thought we played good enough to win, obviously, on defense and special teams, but we just didn’t play good enough on offense. The main thing, didn’t get the run game going, which was huge.

On Deebo’s drop:

Yeah, that was a big one. Third down and with Deebo’s skill set, I would have been shocked if he didn’t score on that play. So, you know, everyone knows the answer to that, Deebo too. He needs to catch that ball.

On De’Vondrae Campbell going to the locker room:

Yeah, he said he didn’t want to play today. He did when I asked him, did he want to go in. That was in the third quarter. … He was going to go in when Dre (Greenlaw) came out.

On the weather and Purdy:

I think it affected both quarterbacks a little bit, but I mean that wasn’t just because of the weather. … I think Brock made some good plays, missed a couple plays but no one on offense did good enough.

On his message to the chance:

They say mathematically we still have a chance. Not really concerned about that right now, pretty disappointed with how we played tonight, especially offensively. I thought our guys played hard, we just didn’t play good enough on offense. We’re gonna get away for three days.

On whether they’ll release Campbell:

We’ll figure out something, but I don’t know that right now. (Did he give you a reason?) No.d

On whether he’s worried about losing the locker room after Campbell quit:

I haven’t lost anybody. That’s somebody who doesn’t want to play football, it’s pretty simple. I think our team and myself being all feel about that, so I don’t think we need to talk about him anymore.

On the interception:

We were hoping for man coverage or a single safety and you can’t tell whether it’s off-man or bump. So the guy stuttered. Jauan ran a stutter-go and the guy buckled his feet a little bit, so Brock threw it and tried to give Jauan a chance. As Jauan was exiting, he ran into him a little bit, which slowed him down and then there was only the corner there, so an unfortunate play.

Brock Purdy

On his interception:

We had a double move on with JJ on the outside and I thought we had the right look with the corner off, thought we were going to get them and just in that moment trying. tobe aggressive and get JJ a shot. When I let the ball go, I couldn’t see the whole release of him at the top of his route, but looking back on it, man, second-and-11, just be smart, try to check the ball down when I can’t see where he’s at.

On the stakes of the pick:

It’s everything, man. Our season, our guys trying to fight to get in this thing and fighting for each other, playing for each other. That’s what comes with playing quarterback and being in this position, you’re trusted with the ball in your hands to make the right decisions in the moment. Something that I’m going to have to learn from for sure, moving forward.

On the playoff outlook:

Don’t really know what the whole picture looks like, but we have a lot of guys in the locker room that are going to continue to fight, including myself, for this organization, for our fan base and for each other, more than anything, to finish out the season in the right way and focus on one game at a time and see where we’re at at the end of it.

On whether he knew Campbell had quit:

Yeah, I had no idea. Obviously I’m trying to focus on the offense and all that. I didn’t know until after the game.

On his play:

I just feel like I had a lot of plays left out there that I could have made for our team. I thought the defense and special teams played so good. That’s what’s hurting me, I feel like I failed the team.

On whether it was a concerted effort to get Deebo Samuel the ball early:

I think that’s just how it went down. We thought the Rams were going to be able to give us some looks for Deebo to make some slash plays and stuff, but more than anything, Deebo was just playing his position and the ball just went his way on certain plays. Obviously I wish I would have connected on a couple more and wish I would have been a little bit more accurate on some of those throws.

On Deebo Samuel:

I love Deebo and I go into every game wanting the best for all my teammates on the field. So, you know, sitting back here after what Deebo said, I feel his frustration. I know he’s a playmaker and if I were him, I’d for sure want to be getting more touches and making plays and stuff. I get that. But for me, I’m just trying to do my job well for this team and at the same time, I love him and I want the best for him.

Fred Warner

On Campbell quitting:

I don’t really want to comment on it much. I’ll probably just want to keep it in house.

On having Greenlaw back:

It meant everything. We shared a moment before we went out and through the tunnel. Everything that he’s gone through and his journey and rehab, thinking about that moment in the Super Bowl and being able to finally go out there and be with him, it meant everything, and he looked like Dre Greenlaw from the moment we started.

On the defensive performance:

I’m proud of the way the guys fought. I think we had opportunities to take the ball away, help our team to win the game. We just didn’t capitalize on those.

On the big picture of being a 6-8 team:

It’s the story of the year, not doing enough to win games, not playing complementary, just coming up a little too short.

On losing to the Rams after the prior dominance over LA:

It’s just two games, honestly. I know they had that one at the end of the year last year, but you know, that’s how the division goes. Teams adapt.

Nick Bosa

On Campbell quitting:

I didn’t know until now, but until I know more about the situation, I’m not going to talk about it.

On returning from injury:

I made it through, I was happy to be back. I thought we were playing pretty good ball on defense. It’s always a good day when you get to walk off the field.

It’s great to see him. I love having him. He’s probably my favorite teammate to ever play with, college and pros. He’s an absolute dog and he was showing it. After a year of not playing and to look like that is pretty impressive.

On the long odds to make the playoffs:

We’re going to find out who wants to be here the next few weeks. Obviously it’s slim. The focus is to win games and to put our best out there.

On if he will continue playing as he may not be 100%

Of course.

On the thought of shutting down guys:

I don’t know. I think if you’re healthy, you should play and I think momentum created in the next few games could be really big for the offseason.

On if they’ll find out the character of the team now:

That’s kind of what the message is now and we’re going to find out who wants to be a Niner.

George Kittle

On Campbell quitting:

Look, if you’re on the roster and you suit up, you’re expected to play. I think anyone in this building that got asked to go in, I would say 100% of everybody would die to get on that football field. … It’s hard to win football games when someone doesn’t want to play football, especially when you’re suited up. That Kind of puts you down, especially when you lose two linebackers (to injury). …

I have never been around anybody that’s ever done that and I hope that I’m never around anybody that does that again.

On Greenlaw:

All I asked of my tight end room today was to play with one-fifth of the energy that Dre Greenlaw brings on every snap, and I thought our tight end room did a good job with that, we brought energy.

Dre Greenlaw is one of my favorite football players to ever watch. The energy that he plays with, the violence that he plays with on every single snap, and you can just tell the energy that he brings to the entire defense and the entire team is infectious. It’s unique. It’s one-of-a-kind, and he is an absolute unicorn of a football player. It was just so fun to see him have the opportunity to play again tonight.

On the offensive performance:

I thought as skill positions, whether it was tight end, quarterback, running back, fullback, wide receiver, like I just said, we could have stepped up our game and played better, and we didn’t. Our defense gave us an unlimited amount of opportunities to go out there and score points. They put us in decent field position and we ultimately end up losing the field-position battle, put our defense in bad positions and they did a good job of wearing us down.

On Deebo’s drop:

I don’t really see Deebo drop passes like that. I think he’s one of the best in the world when it comes to being open across the middle of the field and taking a ball to the house. He’s just so excited to make a play. You guys saw his tweet or whatever it was, like frustration. And I think he’s just — it’s not anxiety, he’s just so giddy and ready to play football and I’ve never seen him drop a pass like that.

On what went wrong offensively:

Our offense, continually throughout the season, I’ve said it 100 times, we have to play better. We have to take advantage of the opportunities that are in front of us, and we did not really do that tonight.

On Purdy taking the blame for the loss:

Brock is a selfless person. He does not have an ego. He is a fantastic leader, he is a fantastic playmaker. We win games because of him. I don’t want him to wear that on his shoulders. But when you’re the quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, there’s always a spotlight on you. There’s always a highlight on you. I say that any quarterback that has ever played for the niners, just an automatic spotlight on you. And I love him for doing that and taking the blame, but it’s not on him.

On what he wants to see from the team:

I’m just going to quote my safety Huff. He broke the team down after the game, and he said that his mindset and his attitude will be 100% effort on every single day, every practice, every single rep, and he will fight until the wheels fall off and he’s been fighting his ass off to get back on the football field this year. He has only gotten so many reps and he’s played really, really good football for us.

On his message to Deebo Samuel:

There’s things that you just have to take on the chin. Like talking to media, take ownership of whatever you had said before, how you played tonight. Take ownership of it, leave it in the past and move on. Because there’s better days ahead for Deebo. There’s plays to be made for Deebo and he has more opportunities ahead of him to make plays for this team.

Dre Greenlaw

On his first game back:

It felt good to just be out there with my brothers, running around.

On his moment with Warner pregame:

He’s just been there with me throughout every step of my career, so he knows how much I want to be out there. He knows how much it meant to me. I know how bad he wanted me out there too. So anytime we can suit up and go out there and play.

On why he came out in the third quarter for a bit:

The knee just kind of felt a little weird, so just wanted to protect myself a little bit.

On where his passion for football comes from:

I think that passion just comes from just not ever being good enough, you know what I mean? Just not always not quite good enough for somebody or something, whatever it may be.

On what he missed:

I missed just letting my anger and frustration out. I just like going to hit people sometimes and that just lets a lot of frustration out.

On how hard it was not to overdo it in rehab:

At this particular time in my career, I can’t afford to get hurt too much more. I don’t want to be in this position again next year where I got to watch the whole team do it. So I try my best, just to try to be as smart as I can on it.

On how much frustration was built up over his time away:

If I was healthy I’d play another game tomorrow.

On Campbell’s decision:

He didn’t want to play, so I guess if you don’t want to play, you don’t got to play.