NFC Notes: 49ers, Cardinals, Rams

49ers

49ers WR Brandon Aiyuk had his best game of the season on Sunday, getting seven targets and notching 45 receiving yards, both season-highs. 49ers HC Kyle Shanahan, who has been notoriously harsh on Aiyuk and other offensive players he’s managed, said that Aiyuk has been better in practice lately, specifically alluding to his GPS times in practice the team uses to measure effort and workload. 

“And it has to do with just how you do everything,” Shanahan said via NBC Sports’ Matt Maiocco. “How you do individual and how you run your routes, how you compete in one-on-one, how you do on the plays that we just put in or trying to script in from a mental standpoint. Whether you do them right? How fast you are? We have the GPS on all these guys and track how hard they run each day. Things like that. And just being consistent with it. And Aiyuk’s strung together a number of really good weeks…And that’s what’s been encouraging about him. And just last week, doing just what he had done the previous few weeks, I thought he took his game to another level. And not just me, but I thought the players felt it. I thought he felt it.”

Cardinals

• Cardinals QB Kyler Murray said the five days off from practice was “definitely helpful” for his ankle injury and he feels “good” for Week 9.  (Josh Weinfuss)
• Cardinals HC Kliff Kingsbury affirmed that Murray could miss an entire week of practice and still be able to play. (Bob McManaman)

Rams

Rams GM Les Snead said their experiment with veteran WR DeSean Jackson didn’t work out as he and HC Sean McVay envisioned.

“I’m not going to give it a grade. One came to mind, but that would probably be the headlines, right?” Snead said, via Lindsey Thiry. “Obviously it was an experiment that we attempted. It didn’t work out as well as we wanted it to, as DeSean wanted it to, as even Sean [McVay] wanted it to, especially those two because they have a relationship that probably goes, it does, I know for a fact, it goes deeper than football. Didn’t work out for us and that is why we somewhat wanted to move in this direction and come up with a win-win in this situation.”

Regarding the Rams’ depth concerns at receiver following Jackson’s trade and Tutu Atwell, Snead said they are discussing internal options but that they must “manage” Cooper Kupp, Robert Woods and Van Jefferson going forward. 

“We’re still discussing that internally because there’s some options that we have internally and how Sean’s going to use them in the offense and how Joe [DeCamillis] can use them on special teams,” Snead said. “We got to walk through that and Sean is aware with our top three, who are playing very well right now, how to — let’s call it, I don’t want to call it a pitch count, per se — but manage some of their load.”

• Regarding Rams’ recently acquired OLB Von Miller, Snead said they are “definitely willing” to explore extension options for Miller: “We discussed that with his representation.” (Lindsey Thiry)
• Rams HC Sean McVay said mentioned rookie WRs Jacob Harris and Ben Skowronek as players they’ll lean on for depth at receiver with Jackson gone. (Thiry)