The NFL playoffs are down to eight teams. That the San Francisco 49ers are one of them might come as a surprise, given the myriad injuries they’ve dealt with this season, but San Francisco has a good shot of making its second Super Bowl appearance in three seasons if it can outlast the top-seeded Seattle Seahawks this weekend.
Thankfully, Brock Purdy and Co. might get some desperately-needed help. The 49ers lost their best pass-catcher during the Wild Card Round when George Kittle suffered a torn Achilles tendon during the first half, but in that game, they were without Ricky Pearsall, who finished fifth on the team with 528 receiving yards in the regular season despite missing eight games with a PCL injury. Pearsall hasn’t played since a five-catch, 85-yard (13.5-FPT) effort against the Chicago Bears in Week 17, but he returned to Tuesday’s walkthrough practice as a limited participant and is trending towards suiting up on Saturday, per the Athletic’s Vic Tafur.
If Pearsall can’t play, San Francisco will be pretty thin at wide receiver, with Jauan Jennings, Demarcus Robinson, Kendrick Bourne, and Jake Tonges the top receiving options. Those players are fine — each had at least 250 receiving yards in the regular season, and Jennings actually led the team with nine receiving touchdowns — but as a sure-handed deep threat, Pearsall adds a dimension to the offense that the others don’t. He’s the 49ers’ highest-rated receiver by Pro Football Focus’ standards, finishing with the 33th-best grades among 135 eligible receivers, with Robinson and Jennings closer to the median and Bourne below the median. Pearsall doesn’t generate much separation, and he’s lost 0.7 yards after the catch relative to expectations, but his inability to get open doesn’t matter much to Purdy, who ranks second in completion percentage over expectation.
With just a $4,800 salary in this weekend’s featured Millionaire DFS contest, Pearsall could carry some good value. While the Seahawks have among the league’s best defenses, allowing the fifth-fewest FPTS per game to opposing wideouts and limiting them to the fewest yards per catch, they’ve been somewhat more susceptible after the catch, mitigating Pearsall’s weakness. Plus, while Seattle has PFF’s top-graded cornerback this season in Devon Witherspoon, he’s likely to spend more of his time guarding Jennings. That would leave Pearsall to go against the less-impactful Riq Woolen, who ranked just 62nd of 112 qualified coverage corners. Pearsall has been most effective on short throws up the left sideline, and Woolen has more frequently lined up on the right.
Additionally, the Seahawks operate in zone defense at among the league’s highest rates, and Pearsall has the team’s highest receiving grade and its highest target share against zone. He’s far from a guarantee to produce — against Seattle, nobody is — but if forced to pick between him and Jennings, whose salary is $5,400, I’d choose Pearsall. To wit, he led the team with seven catches for 108 receiving yards (17.8 FPTS) in the opening game of the season, when he had two catches for 69 yards against Woolen.
