Richard Sherman got burned deep by receiver Marquise Goodwin in his first padded practice with the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday.
Clips of the torching went viral.
Some used the play as a chance to take shots at Sherman, boastfully declaring his career over -- as if any player in his first real practice after returning from a torn Achilles could stay with an Olympic track athlete like Goodwin.
Niners coach Kyle Shanahan used the play as a coaching point, not to criticize Sherman but rather as an example of how he wants his players to practice aggressively. Let fullback Kyle Juszczyk explain:
"Everybody saw the clip of Marquise and Richard in 1-on-1s and [Shanahan] used that as a coaching point," Juszczyk said, via the San Francisco Chronicle. "He didn't get up there and bash on Sherman like, 'We paid you this much and you come out here and give us that?' It was nothing like that. He actually complimented him because it was his very first rep in 1-on-1s since he's been injured. and he didn't hesitate. He was extremely aggressive on the line of scrimmage and, yeah, he got beat deep, but that's what 1-on-1s are for."
Juszczyk said he took the message to heart and applied it to his own reps.
"So, I tried to take that into 1-on-1s and be aggressive," he said. "If a guy like Reuben [Foster] gives me a spin move and gets me, at least I put it out there on the table and was giving it everything I had."
The aggression paid off for Sherman on Tuesday. After getting beat a couple of times by veteran Pierre Garcon, Sherman jumped a route and picked off Jimmy Garoppolo.
Sherman's situation is just the latest example of how training camp shouldn't be boiled down into one- or two-play sequences, but rather viewed from a macro-level, taking all circumstances into account. Sometimes getting burned is part of the process in preparing for a season. Even if that incinerating goes viral.
