George Kittle Gives Great Insight On Why The 49ers Seem So Much Better Than Rest Of The NFL

From Tight End University, George Kittle. Yay! Hey! What's up, bud? Happy birthday to you! All right, we're not doing the whole song. Happy birthday, though, buddy. How old are you? How are we doing? How old are you? 30! Oh, mom, buddy. Wow. Last night was a pretty good little birthday start, huh? Three tuds, felt good about it? Hey, three tuddies for each decade of my life. Why not, baby? I don't know if you saw the graphic. You got the Randy Moss graphic all of a sudden, you know, because you had three tuds. I don't know if you saw the graphic. You got the Randy Moss graphic all of a sudden, you know, because you had three tuds. I don't know if you saw the graphic. You got the Randy Moss graphic all of a sudden, you know, because you had three catches, three touchdowns. You didn't have 163 yards, only 67, but who cares? What a night for you on primetime as you turn 30. Why do you think last night was a jump-off night for you offensively? This happened last year where there became a night where you went off. Brock Purdy and you found it, and you went forever. This year, you haven't really had that day yet. Last night, why last night, you think, George? Last night, you think, George? Hey, Bruce! What's up, man? How's it going? Bruce! Bruce is driving me to work. Ha! Let's see. We have a bunch of really good football players on this team. And, you know, a lot of mouths to feed. But the good thing about all those mouths is there's a bunch of really talented players. So, none of us are very selfish. Some guys are going to have great games some games. Some guys are not going to have a lot of catches some games. It just is what it is. So, I'm just happy that I had an opportunity to go out there and make those plays. And Coach Shane dialed those up for me. Yeah, it looked awesome. Go ahead, AJ. How early in that game do you know that, hey, this could be a big night for me? Is it pretty early on? You know what? I really liked our red zone package for me this week. We do those on Fridays. We had a couple in there. And we had, like, two that we brought in from last year's playoff game versus them. So, I knew we were going to call those. And, you know, when you score a touch on the opening drive, you're like, ah! Well, why can't I get at least one more? And then you get another one. You're like, ah! Why can't I get another one? And then it just kept happening and happening. So, it's just a lot of fun out there with the boys, actually. Yeah, once you take the top off, the ball starts falling in the hoop a little bit more. After a rush touchdown, not even your touchdown, you went over to the crowd and you displayed your undershirt. Now, is that undershirt every game or just this game? And I couldn't read it that clearly. It might have just been sweat stains. Did you know that your shirt had that on underneath your jersey? The F dash dash dash Dallas. Did you know that? Oh, wow. I think that was just on my loop, man. I put it on, you know, just wearing a t-shirt. I don't know how that got on there. I might have been mildly inspired by our guy Gary Plummer who wore that and I'm pretty sure it was the 94 NFC Championship game versus Dallas. So, it's just there's some things that need to be worn for the franchise. I think it's just coincidence that it just happened to appear on my chest on Sunday Night Football. Okay. We thought it would have been a coincidence. Yeah, yeah. Because there was like you sound like you were sneezing a little bit when you're trying to get the shirt up, you know, and then you had like a cramp where you had to stretch your arm down to make sure that it was really seen. It was crazy all the things that had to happen to make sure that shirt was seen. We appreciate it. Last question for me as you continue to drive to work with your old man. Shout out to your dad, by the way, Hidden Pearls podcast. Yeah. Shout out to him. Yeah, shout out, shout out. I was very lucky to be a guest on there. Makes me feel better about my life. Speaking of making you feel better about your life, you guys got a quarterback who is phenomenal. I think the whole world's kind of coming around. Still has some haters. Seventh round draft pick. People are thinking at some point water's going to have to find its level with him. What does he do every single week that makes you think to yourself, is this the greatest quarterback of all time? He's able to throw. He seems to be smarter than everybody. He's a cool guy. Is there anything that we don't notice that we haven't seen that maybe is a reason why he's so great right now, Kittle? You know, besides I think Kyle Branch's theory of him being like a robot from Terminator, the only thing you guys really miss is him charging into his locker before and after every single practice. Besides that, you know, he's doing a great job. He's just so consistent. Every single Wednesday he's dialed in, and that's like our big install day, first and second down passes, all these run cans, pressure cans, all this stuff to get the offense in the right looks. He does a great job of that throughout walkthroughs, throughout practice. He never has any M.A.'s, and it's an incredibly difficult offense. He does a great job with that. You know, I really just think he had all these starts and all these reps throughout college. He played at a really high level. He played at a low level sometimes. But at the end of the day, he played quarterback really well and just gave him an opportunity to succeed at this level with us in a system where Shanahan can dial up some plays for a bunch of skill positions. We can all eat, and it's just when you're part of that offense, as long as you don't turn the ball over and you just complete some passes, the dogs are going to hunt, baby. Feels like he's one of the boys, too. Accurate? Hey, Bird Dog's that boy. He's like that. Yeah, it feels like it. He seems like a great leader. I love it. Darius has a question for you, George. Yeah, man. Obviously, the offense, you guys make all the headlines, as you should, a bunch of dogs over there. But that defensive side of the ball, you know, Robert Saleh, Steve Wilks, Demiko Ryans, whoever's calling the shots, they don't miss a beat. What's it like practicing against those guys in training camp, and what's the vibe like with those guys? You know what? They're the worst in training camp, not going to lie. They're just the worst. I love our D-line, though. They're always great. And I will say this also. You know, having an entire training camp without Nick Bosa wreaking havoc on our offense every play that he's not going against Trent Williams was good for our offense. I think that's one of the reasons that we've been able to click so early is because we were actually able to practice without having every play getting missed. So that's nothing against our offensive tackles. It's just that's how good Nick Bosa is. Yeah. But, you know, you look at our defensive line. Matt Hargrave, he's been phenomenal. Armstead is having a wonderful year, and he's not getting any attention on it at all. But if you watch that tape, he just blows up that interior offensive line every single time. Ken Law's finding his stride. Nick Bosa's Nick Bosa. And then, I mean, Fred Warner, Trey Greenlaw, Oren Burks, our linebacks are playing at an incredibly high level. They're violent. They're physical. I mean, HB, when you're a linebacker playing on Sunday Night Football, is there any better stat line than an interception, a forced fumble, and a sack? No. I'd say Fred put it together at the right time. You could have zero tackles, too. It doesn't matter. Go ahead, AJ. George, is this a normal, like, Victory Monday type deal where your dad drives you to work? And I would assume you got to text him to pick you up when everything's done? You know what, it's my birthday, so my whole family's in town. And my family takes a party bus to the games just because we usually have big crowds in. And so I rode the party bus with the family last night on the way home. Left the car at work, didn't, you know, feel like driving solo. Smart. Decided to quit and ride for my pops. You know, I had to celebrate the man, too, Eddie Guerrero's birthday today as well. So, hey. I didn't know you shared a birthday with Eddie Guerrero. Happy birthday, Eddie Guerrero. La viva la raza. Rest in peace, pal. Everybody's paying tribute to Eddie and everything he did. Shout out to you. I did not know. Ah, Ken Energy, huh? When are you getting back in WWE? When? Whenever it's available in a city near me, I'll be there every single time. There's no one like the WWE, the way they take care of us athletes. They are fantastic. And I just want to say, Pat, man, your life is so stupid, man. Dumbest. You're going to go out there, just going to go out there and just talk to the great people of Indianapolis, these great Midwest people, having a wonderful time. I think you're going to watch John Cena tag team with L.A. Knight, the hottest of hot. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. George, it was dumb. It was very, very dumb. It was one of the most absurd. You're going to sit next to Michael Cole, too, and that hated-ass Corey Graves. He is a little bit of a hated-ass. He looked good, though. I don't know if you guys saw how good he looked. He always looked good. Proper. I mean, he was in great. Paul Heyman, two feet in front of me, too, for the entire—if we're just going to start adding goats in there. Paul Heyman, have you seen this? I did not know this because I'm in the middle of football season. His hair is white. He looks terrible. He's wearing ill-fitting suits because Roman hasn't been around. So funny. I laughed so hard. Like, what a professional. That's what I said. I said, bro, is everything OK? He goes, our trouble chief has not been around. And I just started, like, crying, laughing. And, yeah, it was great to see everybody over there. I love them. And anytime I get the opportunity—to your point—anytime I get the opportunity to do some stuff with WWE, I'm going back. I miss the hell out of them. But I'm not in the middle of a potential goat run here as tight end for the San Francisco 49ers. Because your team appears right now to be maybe the most dominant team, not only in the NFL, but in, like, the history. Your guys' end of the season last year, that NXT Championship game, I know it sucks. How much do you think that propelled you guys into this season to be like, hey, there's no messing around. There's no figues. We're on a mission. Do you think that played any part of this? Or what do you think about your team right now? No. I mean, like, it's hard to—you know, I hate talking about the NXT Championship game. We lost. Eagles won. It is what it is. You know, we lost. They won. You know, if the same thing happened to them, I'm assuming that we probably would have won that game, too. It is what it is. But I just think our team as a whole, when you win 12 games straight, and then you have something like that happen that's kind of out of your control, it's just like, all right, well, let's just hit the ground running and hit it harder than we did last year. And I think that's what we've done. And I just think that Brock's gotten more comfortable. We've added pieces on defense. And it's just fun, also, when you have Iyuk, who's just dominated every training camp. He's dominated his chemistry with Purr Dog. D-Bo's D-Bo. Okay, Christian McCaffrey, I hope that—I don't gamble, but I hope that you guys have been on a touchdown parlay for him for every week for, I don't know, three and a couple seasons. Fourteen. Yep. Yeah, 14 straight weeks, I think, is what it is. You should probably keep hammering that one home. He's also more—I don't want to say he's more durable, but this year he's taken a lot of shots and just popping right back up. Is he more jocked than ever right now? Him and Bosa just kind of like photosynthesize outside in the San Francisco sun. That's just what they do. It's crazy. Me and Juice are just sitting there practicing our golf swings, watching, like, working out, hanging out. They're just out there, like, just out there in the sun relaxing. It's amazing. They look amazing. They're playing amazing. Your team is hot. Ty has a question, though. I don't think he's happy. Yeah, George, I don't know if you're aware, but Iowa tight ends had five receiving touchdowns yesterday. And listen, I know you're one of the founding fathers, but I'll be honest. As an Iowa boy, it pained me very much that you decided to go with tight end you instead of Iowa in the introductions last night. Just curious kind of what spurred that. What decision was behind that? Was it because you said, hey, I don't want to piss Brock off and kind of shit on him, letting him know that he went to the kind of bottom rung school in the state, obviously Iowa being the superior program. But what was behind that decision? Can you just kind of enlighten me a little bit? Well, I was one of the founding fathers of Titan University, man. I just want to make sure our message is getting out there that all tight ends are a part of the university. And so I'm just going to be one that's kind of leading the charge, tip of the spear, as you may say. That's all it is. Just letting everybody, all these tight ends know that we're all part of Titan University and you just got to say it with your chest. Yeah. And what Titan University is doing, it feels like, huh? Tight ends roll. Hey, I'm going. Hey, going right now. You feel it. Are you kidding me, man? I love watching. We have so many highlights just yesterday. All these tight ends scoring touchdowns, spiking it, celebrating. It's fun too, man. Like I love when tight ends score and they don't have a celebration plan. It's just how many guys can I hug in the end zone? And I just absolutely love that mindset. Just hugs and spikes, baby. That's what tight ends do. Tone has a question for you. George. I think I saw it. I'm sorry. Speaking of tight ends, when you saw the Lions run the reverse flea flicker pass down the silent, was there some worry? Did you know that you guys were going to run that last night? Yeah. So like we've had it installed since like week eight of last year. We just never called it. And I was sitting there. It's like, huh? I'm watching the port of play. Actually, I'm sitting there with my agent who's also Sam's agent. He goes, Oh, look, Sam, was that a second touch? I was like, yeah, we have that play in the night. I hope we still call it. Cause you know, like sometimes coaches see stuff like, oh, we can't call that now. Cause they called that. I was very thankful that we did call. And I think I had like three more yards on it, but Sam had, I mean, what a day for that guy. What a rookie. Just balling out. Nine more feet. I think, you know, if you think, I do appreciate the fact that that can get ruined. That happens like fake punts and stuff like that. You see it run one time by another team. It's like, all right, now every team is going to prepare for that. Throw it out. Such a good play. And I also like the fact that you're like, people are telling us that we stole that from the Lions. We stole that from the Leafs. Okay. Week eight last year. Had that thing in for a while. We ain't doing that. Although Ben Johnson over there is a creative guru. He's thinking like Kyle Shanahan. Okay. Here's a question. Kyle Shanahan every day. Is he just thinking of new plays? Awesome plays? What's he like on a day-to-day and why do you think his offense has been so effective? Cause this is what people are saying. The people that hate Brock Purdy say any quarterback you put in Kyle Shanahan's offense, it'll work with those weapons. Now there's a quarterback that's on the other team last night. Don't even have to talk about it. But that's why people talk about Shanahan's offense. Do you guys recognize that? And why do you think Shanahan is so good at designing plays for your team to succeed with? Well, I will say it's like being a part of Kyle's offense for the last seven years, it has evolved and changed drastically. Like there are similarities. We run outside zone. We run gap scheme. We run play action. But like the majority of plays that we used to call, we don't really call them anymore. We call like, I would say like variations of them. But the creativeness to them is just, it's changed a lot. And to people that think any quarterback can play in this offense, you guys should see our installs and the things that quarterbacks have to deal with every single day when they look at these things. And Kyle, we play a Sunday night game and I get like six texts from my tight ends coach saying, Hey, we just added six plays for the game tonight at like noon. I'm just like, Oh wait, I wouldn't get to practice these, but I'm glad that we have these in. And yes, I may have ran these three to four weeks ago, but would have loved to practice them. And just for Brock to be able to handle that, look at that call sheet, handle however many plays, it feels like 250 plays and then go out there and not think and just play ball. Not everybody can do that. There's a lot of guys that go out there and they think about things. They think about the lights. They think about, Oh wow, they have a really good defense. Oh, maybe I'm not this good. Maybe I can't do this. Brock just goes out there and plays football. And that is something, and that is an ability that not everybody in the NFL has. And that's what makes them better than just a system quarterback. I mean, I was a system tight end for a while until I just had to continue to play at a high level. But, you know, I think, I think all the hate really comes from just being an Iowa state cyclist. I think that's what it is. Yeah. Well, Iowa state certainly has not had a lot of good things said about it on this program because Ty is as obnoxious as you could be as an Iowa Hawkeye fan. But you just said something fascinating there that doesn't happen on a regular basis. Adding plays late in the week. A lot of people just Wednesday. Here's what we're doing Thursday. Here's what we're doing Friday. We're working on everything we just worked on. Walk through what we just worked on. Kyle, you have to have a certain type of player to be able to handle that. Not just a quarterback, but everywhere. John Lynch deserves some credit, I guess, for finding all you freaks. I guess that is. Yeah, I mean, dude, like, Kyle's changing plays. And, like, we'll have our whole install on Wednesday. First and second down pass plays. First and second down runs. And then we'll add some more. So then Thursdays are our third downs and our short yardage stuff. And then we'll add some more in or we'll change some stuff that he didn't like. And then Fridays, kind of a little bit mix of that, too. We have, like, this big run tape with the whole offense where he kind of talks about the run plays that he likes, what he doesn't like, what he's going to add, what he's going to change. And, like, the core part of the install stays the same. But there's just little ones that he throws in there. And then, like, he made up a play last night in the middle of the third quarter. Just made it up. He goes, hey, this is what we're going to call it. I was like, awesome. Incomplete pass. Wasn't a great idea. They're not all home runs, but it is what it is. He's trying out there, and I just appreciate that. But when you have weapons like we have, Kyle does such a great job about putting our best players in positions to succeed. Whether it's Deebo on an end cut, me running down the sideline, IU getting a one-on-one matchup versus a corner, Christian getting a late choice route, like, against a linebacker. That's all it is. He's putting us in positions to succeed. And Brock has to piece it all apart. Go ahead, AJ. George, when we watch your offense play, a lot of people always say, oh, yeah, why doesn't every team do all this? And I'm talking of your pre-snap motions, shifts, like all the little jet motions, whatever it does to get the defense kind of on their heels. Can you talk a little bit about how much you guys actually have to work on that? Because it's not like, oh, hey, yeah, we're going to be one of those teams that all of a sudden does all the pre-snap stuff. Like, you have to do that millions of times, I feel like. Yeah, I mean, like, that's one of the things, like, the variations, how this offense has evolved. It's just like it used to be a motion pre-snap, the Y is going to go over here just to get, you know, from a two-by-two to a three-by-one. Then we started doing all, like, I don't know, we call them plane motions, delta motions, where the wide receiver is just running behind to make it look like a jet sweep. And then you have the cheat motions, like what Tyreek does with the Dolphins. We do it here now. We added our spirit, spirit bros motions. That's when me and Juice are running sideways. Spirit bros. Spirit bros airlines. Oh, spirit airlines, got it, not spirit. I thought spirit, like excitement. You're saying spirit airlines, got it. So, like, all the motions, they're planes, right? So, spirit, delta. Oh. Yeah. You have to make it make sense because there's a lot of stuff going on. So, like, there is a lot of practice and stuff in that. You have to get through all the walkthroughs because every single play, like, I don't know, 80% of our plays have motions or different things on it. And so just being in the system for a while, and then Kyle's gotten better at installing that and explaining it to guys so younger guys may be able to pick it up. And when you can do all that stuff, you take, like, a three, you can come out in a three-by-one. I can motion. Then we can send a wide receiver in a motion, right, pre-snap. And then Juice can also motion. And all of a sudden it's a three-by-one on the opposite side. And the defense is talking, trying to make all these adjustments. And it's just like, oh, wait, I have this guy. Wait, no, you have this guy. And someone's running on the seam scot-free. And the ball's being snapped right now. And the quarterback just so happens to be a guy who can decipher all your mess-ups that are happening in real time. That is a weapon. Yeah. You guys are having a good time over there, it appears. Yeah, as you should. Last question here, and we can't thank you enough for your time on your birthday here. Connor, man. Yeah, George, you probably don't know this, but most NFL teams try and get better every week. And with the 49ers, it just feels like there's no area of your team where you can get better. How do you guys actually go into every single game week and think, like, we've got to change this, we've got to change that. And then with all these dominant wins, do you and Trent Williams and McCaffrey and Bosa still do your post-game breakdowns of what they were doing? Or do you guys just say, yeah, there's nothing to talk about. We just beat the hell out of that team. Let's go home and have some fun. You know, watching the tape, this was actually, I watched it last night. And in my opinion, one of our cleanest games in the run game, which makes me really happy. I thought we were flying around. U-Strek had a phenomenal game. Our off the tackles were playing well. But you still see stuff. Like, we install plays for them to be home runs, especially when you have a guy carrying the ball, like Christian McCaffrey or Deaver Samuel. And so we want these outside zone plays. We want these gap schemes. We want to be able to account for everybody to get our footwork right, our hand placement right, our technique right on rollouts, you know, good on the inside shirt. So, like, we want to, we're going to continue to get better at that stuff so that you see more 50, 60, 70-yard runs from our guys in the backfield just because of how talented they are. And also, like, when you watch the dark tape, I don't know how many other teams have wide receivers blocking downfield with the aggression. 30 yards! 40 yards down the field, George. Oh, yeah. It's a mindset. And the boys have it. And it's fun to play with. Hell, yeah. Well, you're fun to chit-chat with and watch play football. Three tuds last night. Just turned 30? Fuck, yeah, I did. George, so close. Yeah. Shoot. We knew one was coming, George! Yeah, we did. We knew it's your birthday. Okay. Do you want another? Three tuds last night. You want a couple more? No, no, no. I want A.J. to say it for me. First birthday, A.J. Go ahead, A.J. I'm good, George. I'm good. You know what? That's the least surprising thing coming from an Ohio State Buckeye. Just all squishy. Goodness gracious. Hey, enjoy your birthday. Enjoy work. We don't know how you guys are going to get better, but we can't wait to see how you do. You're the man, and we can't thank you enough for your time here, pal. Hey, what? What? Ladies and gentlemen, George Kendall. Love you, guys. See you, boys. You too, buddy. Hey, George!