Atlanta Falcons must avoid turnovers, and more from Niner Noise

The Atlanta Falcons will look to avoid an upset when they travel to Levi’s Stadium to take on the San Francisco 49ers.

This week I spoke with Douglas Totten, editor of Niner Noise, which is our FanSided affiliate site that covers the San Francisco 49ers. It’s great to be able to get a 49ers perspective on Sunday’s game and the season up to this point. Here’s my five questions.

What do you make of the decision to bench Colin Kaepernick?

DT: To be blunt, Kaepernick deserves it. He hasn’t done much of anything all season to help the team win. True, a lot of the blame can be placed on a porous right side of the line, but Kap has the best receiving corps he has ever played with and is unable to get his playmakers the ball.

MORE FROM FALCONS-49ERS:

• Falcons at 49ers: Tale of the tape
• Ten things Falcons must do to beat 49ers
• Blogging Dirty staff predict Falcons-49ers

I like Kap and want to see him do well, but it looks like that won’t be in San Francisco. It’ll be interesting to see if he returns to the starting role this season, as it appears will be the case, or not.

What’s been the biggest problem for the 49ers this season?

DT: Jed York and Trent Baalke. They are the ones who pushed Jim Harbaugh out and made a very questionable hiring decision with Jim Tomsula. The product on the field is awful. I blame the people who put the product there.

Do you think Jim Tomsula is the man to lead the turnaround?

DT: No, but I do think he should be kept around for one more year, as next year will likely be awful as well. That way the 49ers can start a new coach off on what will hopefully be a slightly better foot.

What should the Falcons be most concerned about in this game?

DT: The Falcons should be most concerned about turnovers. The 49ers can’t keep up with the Falcons offense when it is clicking, and presumably not with Gabbert under center either. The one way the 49ers can stay in this game is through turnovers, of which the Falcons have had several recently. If the Falcons aren’t careful with this, the 49ers could pull off a surprise.

What’s your prediction for this game and why?

DT: The 49ers simply aren’t good enough to compete with the Falcons this year. Falcons win 31-13.