Super Subs

Backups stepping up to keep 49ers rolling

- Craig Massei

It’s not just the growing list of rising stars and established performers throughout the lineup this season that kept the 49ers undefeated deep into November on their way to the second-best start in franchise history.

It’s also the guys behind them. Unheralded youngsters pushed into lead roles didn’t just step up in place of front-line starters when called upon during San Francisco’s surge through the first two months of the season. They also played their own part and put their own unique stamp on the team’s success through the 49ers’ 8-0 start.

Beginning in Week 2 when star offensive tackle Joe Staley was lost for six weeks with a broken leg, the 49ers lost four key starters — two of them multiple Pro Bowlers — to injury for an extensive period during a three-game stretch into October.

But the 49ers just kept humming along, getting surprising contributions from reserves that never before had been asked to make a NFL start.

San Francisco improved to 2-0 the day Staley was injured. The 49ers were 8-0 on the day the six-time Pro Bowler returned to the lineup.

After San Francisco became the only NFL team to complete the first half of this season undefeated, 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan was asked the next week in early November what he was most impressed about with his team when looking back on those extraordinary first two-plus months.

“I’ve been impressed the most with the resilience of our guys in the next-man-up type deal,” Shanahan responded. “We’ve had some guys go down in some key spots and the guys have come out there and stepped right in and just really done their job, and nobody’s made a big deal about it.”

Nobody’s made a big deal about it because there was no big deal that needed to be made.