San Francisco 49ers: Benching Zane Beadles would be right move

By Nicholas McGee | Sep 13, 2017

GLENDALE, AZ - NOVEMBER 13: Guard Zane Beadles /

Kyle Shanahan has hinted that guard Zane Beadles could be benched, a move the San Francisco 49ers head coach would be completely right to make.

Admitting mistakes and making changes is a key part of any new head coach’s growth and, one game into his tenure, Kyle Shanahan appears to have recognized there is a problem on the interior of the San Francisco 49ers offensive line.

The Niners were dominated up front by the Carolina Panthers in their season opener, with guard Zane Beadles struggling massively. Beadles, according to Pro Football Focus’ Jeff Deeney, gave up four hurries and a sack, which led to a Brian Hoyer fumble that was cashed in by the Panthers with the first touchdown of the game three plays later.

It may only be just one game, but Beadles has a history of sloppy play at the guard position with the 49ers. He registered 14 blown blocks in the passing game — only Joshua Garnett (15) had more for San Francisco — and seven in the run game in 2016, according to the Football Outsiders’ Almanac.

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And Shanahan seems to have realized Beadles is not the answer at left guard and appears ready to make the move to former Detroit Lion Laken Tomlinson, who the 49ers acquired in preseason in a trade. Speaking at his Monday press conference, Shanahan confirmed the players on the interior of the offensive line would compete for playing time this week in practice (per Niners Nation):

"“We’ll look at that every week. We did last week, too. We’ve got a group of guys on our roster – they’ll battle. They had three days to do it last week; they’ll have three days to battle and we’ll put out (on) Sunday whatever we think our best lineup is.”"

As Tomlinson has never performed the blocking techniques employed in the Shanahan offense, it was always unlikely he was going to play Week 1. However, Shanahan is expecting progress from the former first-round pick:

"“Asking him to do something he never did in college or the NFL is a little tough with just a few (practice) reps. He’ll have more reps this week… Usually the more reps a guy gets, the better chance he has.”"

Though Shanahan did not say it explicitly, this was him indicating that Tomlinson could get his shot this Sunday against the Seattle Seahawks. And, though, Seattle is an incredibly tough place for a player to make their debut for a new team, starting Tomlinson over Beadles this weekend would unquestionably be the right move.

Beadles is at his very best a mediocre player who is only declining and should not be in long term plans of this football team — he is a free agent in 2019.

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By contrast, Tomlinson is only 25 and was once considered good enough to spend a first-round pick on. It is worth the 49ers seeing what they have in him right now rather than making the suicidal decision of trotting Beadles out against a Seattle defensive front that has the talent to exploit his weaknesses to an even greater extent than Carolina’s did.