In a surprising turn of events, the San Francisco 49ers announced the firing of defensive coordinator Steve Wilks today.
The 2023 season was Wilks’ first at the helm of the team’s star-studded defense. His unit’s performance, statistically speaking, was largely favorable. San Francisco finished third in yardage surrendered and eighth in points allowed this year. The team racked up 48 sacks and 28 takeaways.
However, the defense notably faltered in the postseason. San Fran gave up 21 points to Green Bay and 31 to Detroit; it required second-half offensive surges to come back and win both games. And, of course, Wilks’ unit surrendered the game-winning touchdown to Mecole Hardman in the waning seconds of Super Bowl 58.
It was a recurring trend. San Fran’s been a contender for half a decade now, but every season in that span has ultimately concluded with a heartbreaking playoff loss.
Why Was Steve Wilks Fired?
49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan delivered the news of Wilks’ firing during a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, per NBC Sports. He acknowledged it wasn’t an easy call to let Wilks go.
“(It’s a) really tough decision because really it says nothing about Steve as a man or as a football coach,” Shanahan said. “He’s exactly what we wanted as a man. And he’s a great football coach.
“But just where we’re going, where we’re at with our team from a scheme standpoint and things like that. Looking through it all throughout the year and these last few days, (I) felt pretty strongly this was the decision that was best for our organization.”
Wilks had primarily been a DBs coach through the majority of his coaching career. The 54-year-old has coached defensive backs at a number of different stops over the past 30 years. According to Shanahan, getting Wilks to marry the pass rush to his coverage units was something of a struggle.
“You want to tie things together, and Steve was always working to do that,” Shanahan said. “There’s no doubt about that. But it was just for his background, and how it ended up with us, it was harder than it needed to be, and I felt it would improve us going a different direction.”
Shanahan’s defenses have been coordinated by current head coaches like Robert Saleh and DeMeco Ryans in the recent past. You can consider that high caliber of coordinator as a testament to the fact that Shanahan has high expectations for his defense. If the below quote from ESPN is any indication, Shanahan is not second-guessing his decision, hard though it may have been.
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“I knew that was a challenge,” Shanahan said. “It was real tough losing DeMeco. It was tough losing Saleh the year before. We had committed to not just the system but the players that had been in the system from our D line or linebackers — they had played in it for such a long time.
“It was my goal to not have to change all of them and bringing in Steve, who was unbelievable and how loyal he was, and him trying to do it, but it just ended up not being the right fit, and it hurt for me to do this, but that’s exactly why I had to.”
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