The San Francisco 49ers suffered a bad loss in Week 5, with the Arizona Cardinals coming back in the fourth quarter for a 24-23 win. In one sense, however, the 49ers’ fate may have been sealed late in the first half.
49ers kicker Jake Moody hurt his ankle late in the first half while trying to make a tackle on a kickoff during Sunday’s game at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Ca. The injury was serious enough that Moody never returned to the game and actually had to be carted off the field.
Punter Mitch Wishnowsky was pressed into duty as the team’s emergency kicker and actually made a 26-yard field goal to end the first half. However, the Niners did not lean on that in the second half and it hurt them significantly in one moment late in the third quarter.
The 49ers got the ball down to Arizona’s 13-yard line while holding a 23-13 lead late in the third, but a false start penalty, a sack and an incompletion backed them up to 4th-and-23 from Arizona’s 27. Under normal circumstances, this would be no problem, as a 44-yard field goal try would be well within range for your standard NFL kicker. With no reliable option, though, the 49ers tried for a fourth-down conversation, one which did not come close to success.
Instead of making it 26-13 via a field goal with the fourth quarter looming, the Niners came away with nothing and the door was left open to the Cardinals to come back. They did so, engineering two scoring drives in the fourth, including a touchdown and a two-point conversion. Arizona won 24-23.
This has been a nightmare season for the 49ers on the injury front, but losing their kicker mid-game is a new one and it probably directly cost them a victory. It also demonstrates why some teams have at least considered using non-kickers on kickoffs in order to avoid exposing actual kickers to moments just like the one Moody experienced.
