FULL SCORE
Nick Shook’s delivery:
San Francisco 49ers 26, Cleveland Browns 8
- Purdy rebounds. Six days after enduring an ugly performance in a win over Carolina, Purdy looked a lot more like his usual self. The stats — 16-of-29, 168 yards, one touchdown pass — don’t quite suggest it, but Purdy made some key plays by navigating the pocket and rolling away from pressure, preventing Cleveland’s ferocious pass rush from making a significant difference. Even more impressively, Purdy completed many of these tunnels on a windy day in late November along the shores of Lake Erie that included wind gusts of up to 20 miles per hour. Unlike previous weeks, Purdy’s passes were delivered with more zip, were mostly accurate and represented a much-needed improvement from where he started when he returned from injury. That’s good news for a 49ers team that will need its quarterback at his best going forward.
- Gifts of Doom Brown. As has been the case for much of the 2025 season, the Cleveland Browns’ defense kept the 49ers within striking distance for much of Sunday’s game. It forced four punts on San Francisco’s first six possessions, and while the Browns didn’t record a win, the final score is once again not indicative of how Jim Schwartz’s unit fared. The rest of the game, however, is where the Browns lost their way. Kevin Stefanski faces fourth-and-1 at the 33 midway through the third quarter for a 10-8 game. Harold Fannin Jr. his first such use of his career. Fannin fumbled the snap, leading to a significant giveaway by the Browns, 32. Undrafted rookie Gage Larvadain fumbled two punts and lost the second, giving the 49ers the ball at Cleveland’s 18 and all but giving up any hope of a comeback in a 17-8 game early in the fourth. Both turnovers led to touchdowns, taking a two-point play and turning it into a 15-point deficit, an insurmountable margin for the Browns’ low-air offense. Add in a questionable aggressive decision to go for it at the 20-point in San Francisco early in the contest, and it’s easy to see how Cleveland — a team with few mistakes for mistakes — ended up in a losing streak.
- The Niners pass rush is surprising. Then lost Nick Bosa and Michael Williams due to injuries, San Francisco’s pass rush has all but disappeared in recent weeks. That was not the case on Sunday. Clelyn Ferrell notched two sacks as part of a team-best nine tackle day while Keion White recorded another as part of a defensive effort that saw the 49ers record a pressure percentage of 36.7%. Especially on third down, San Francisco’s pass rush made for a hectic experience for the rookie quarterback Shedeur Sanders in just his second NFL start, fueled a Browns offense that still managed 253 total yards but yielded just eight scores. There’s no guarantee that this pass deadline will suddenly become a frequent contributor, but for one Sunday, it was nice to see the Niners getting after the quarterback more than usual.
Next Gen Stats Insights from 49ers-Browns (via NFL Pro): Shedeur Sanders averaged 3.37 seconds to throw in his second start, the longest time thrown by a Browns quarterback in the last three seasons. As a result, the 49ers pass rush managed to generate a 36.7% pressure percentage, the second-highest of the season (and the highest without Nick Bosa), while notching three sacks, despite only being held once.
NFL Research: Christian McCaffrey cleared 800 rushing yards and 800 receiving yards in a season for the third time in his career, joining Marshall Faulk as the only two players to accomplish the feat.