Willis has been to the Pro Bowl after each of his first two seasons. Greg Trott/Getty Images

2009 Schedule

September 13 at Arizona 20 SEATTLE 27 at Minnesota October 4 ST. LOUIS 11 ATLANTA 18 Bye 25 at Houston November 1 at Indianapolis 8 TENNESSEE 12 CHICAGO (T) 22 at Green Bay 29 JACKSONVILLE December 6 at Seattle 14 ARIZONA (M) 20 at Philadelphia 27 DETROIT January 3 at St. Louis

SPOTLIGHT

Dashon Goldson, Free safety: He has watched so much video during his first two years in the NFL, footage of teammates who started ahead of him and top safeties such as the Ravens' Ed Reed and the Steelers' Troy Polamalu, that Goldson knows well how his position is supposed to be played. Now he just has to, well, play his position. "I've gotten a lot of what I would call mental reps over the last two years," says Goldson. "I've seen what some safeties bring to their teams, flying all over the place, going sideline to sideline being a ball hawk. I want to be someone who can do the same." A cornerback at Washington who was selected in the fourth round of the 2007 draft, the 6' 2" Goldson has good cover skills and attacks the line of scrimmage so aggressively that he had to be told to stop hitting offensive linemen during training camp. "The key is for him to continue to get comfortable with the scheme, not thinking as much but just going," coach Mike Singletary says. "He's got to play fast." Goldson also must stay healthy. He missed seven games last season with a knee injury, but he feels good now and is ready to make a video of his own. "If I get through a full season," he says, "I know I can be a playmaker."

This article appears in the September 7, 2009 issue of Sports Illustrated.

The franchise once led by Joe Montana and Steve Young needs one of its two unspectacular passers to take charge.

A long-accepted football axiom has held that if a team can run the ball and stop the run, it will win. Coach Mike Singletary pondered that one morning at training camp, then offered a revision. "If you can stop the run and run the ball, you have a chance in any game, but when you go up against teams that can also do those things, you've only got a 50-50 chance," he said. "To get to the next level, to get to where we want to be, you've got to give yourself better odds than that. So, yes, if you can run the ball and stop the run, you can win, but to really be successful you've got to have balance on offense."

Led by a slimmed-down and motivated Frank Gore at running back, San Francisco should have no trouble generating a ground game. With All-Pro Patrick Willis emerging as one of the league's best linebackers as he heads into his third season, the defense should be stout enough. The great unknown is whether the 49ers have a quarterback who can better those 50-50 odds, a quandary that has marked this franchise for so long that it's easy to forget San Francisco was once the team of Joe Montana and Steve Young.

The candidates are well known, and it is debatable whether that is a good thing. Eighth-year veteran Shaun Hill, who played in nine games last season, and Alex Smith, the No. 1 draft pick in 2005 who has battled injuries and inconsistency, staged a competition in camp that Hill won mostly because Singletary perceived him to be the quarterback less likely to turn the ball over. Even so, Hill's hold on the job is precarious -- Smith is the more talented of the two when healthy -- and the closest Singletary came to paying his quarterbacks a compliment was to call Hill "less of a mystery."

"First, I am looking for leadership, a guy who can take control of the offense and get the other guys to believe in him," Singletary says. "If something goes wrong, don't bring it to the sideline -- handle it on the field. Second, I am looking for execution. The last thing, and this is essential: Take care of the football." (Singletary's disdain for turnovers was evident when, after Smith threw an interception in practice, the coach banished him for 20 minutes to a hill overlooking the field.)

Much was written about the physical two-a-day practices that Singletary, in his first full season as coach, ran during camp, but more telling was the giant clock that counted down from three seconds every time the ball was snapped. San Francisco quarterbacks were sacked a league-high 55 times in 2008, and the message was clear: Get rid of the ball.

Assisting Hill (or Smith) will be a line that is expected to be improved. Fifth-year veteran Adam Snyder, who played various positions last season, has found a home at right tackle, the team's weakest spot a year ago. He beat out free-agent signee Marvel Smith, who becomes a valuable backup. Left tackle Joe Staley, a third-year player who moved over from the right side before last season, is more settled. "This is not a young and inexperienced group anymore," says center Eric Heitmann, the veteran of the bunch at 29. "We are not going in with position battles and guys moving from the right to the left side like Joe did last year, and we have great depth. We're in a much better position to give our quarterback an opportunity to succeed."

It would have helped if Michael Crabtree, the Texas Tech wideout taken at No. 10 in the draft, hadn't missed camp in a contract dispute. An elite pass catcher is needed to offset the assortment of average ones (Isaac Bruce, Arnaz Battle, etc.) on the roster. There are other concerns, including the absence of a proven pass rusher, but the season will most likely hinge on whether Hill or Smith can lift the offense.

The odds of that? Call it 50-50.

-- George Dohrmann