The San Francisco 49ers are facing one of those seasons

They've done that too: In 2020, after their 2019 Super Bowl season, they started 2-3 amid a massive wave of injuries and ended up with a 6-10 season. In 2021, they started 3-5 but won seven of their last 10 games and finished the season 10-7, making the playoffs and then reaching the NFC Championship Game. In 2022, they started 3-4 but finished the regular season with a 10-0 streak and again reached the NFC Championship Game.

The 49ers have already shown some weaknesses this season. They still have 14 games to go and are proud of their final kick.

“It's definitely a difficult start,” said Bosa. “But there's still a lot of football to play. We've already been through some difficult phases. But we just have to stick together. We have the guys who can do it.”

But is that so? Will all this change when McCaffrey, Samuel and Kittle are back? When the defense is better organized under new coordinator Nick Sorensen instead of allowing a series of long passes every week? When the special teams don't fall apart at particularly crucial moments, as they did on Sunday?

The benefit of destroying a game across the board is that no one aspect is scrutinized more than another. The problem: There are a lot of things to fix.

“We could have decided it on offense, defense or special teams,” Shanahan said. “When all three end up going at it, that's the most frustrating part.”

The bad points of the special teams: Jake Moody's 55-yard miss that could have decided the game, allowing Xavier Smith's 38-yard punt return in the final minute that would have set up the Rams' game-winning field goal, and – perhaps most importantly – allowing a game-winning Rams fake punt in the second quarter.

“That's when I thought we had a chance to get away and not give them any hope,” Shanahan said of the fake punt. “And that gave them a lot of hope. It got them back in the game.”

Add to that the fact that the 49ers allowed a blocked punt that changed the tenor of the game against Minnesota early on, and the 49ers have a pretty serious emergency on their hands. Can this be fixed? Shanahan is known for not getting too caught up in special teams. He just wants them to kick well and cover well and not screw up the game for him on offense and defense. Well, special teams do help screw up games. But I think this is fixable. Right now, this looks more like a series of bad mistakes at the wrong time. It's probably an accumulation of bad luck in a small sample size. And that's what it should be.

On offense, the worst moment came when Ronnie Bell, who was only in the game because of his injury, got wide open on the 49ers' last possession but absolutely botched the pass from Purdy. A pass there and an easy field goal would have sealed the win. But no.

Why was Bell even in the game, who had dropped at least one pass the previous Sunday and has already dropped a lot of passes in his short 49ers career? The 49ers put him there instead of veteran Chris Conley, who is not a dropper, and rookie Jacob Cowings, who should get a chance to prove what he can do.

“We rotate a lot of guys,” Shanahan said. “He was the guy out there. Chris Conley did it early in the game. … Ronnie had a hell of a training camp. He had a hell of a week of practice. But he's got to get the catch.”