SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- With a history that dates to their formative years as young Tampa Bay Buccaneers assistants, a reunion between San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan and defensive coordinator Raheem Morris always seemed inevitable.
Shanahan wanted to hire Morris when he took over the Niners in 2017, a move that was blocked by the Atlanta Falcons. Despite that, Shanahan's desire to work again with Morris became stronger after Morris helped the rival Los Angeles Rams win Super Bowl LVI.
"I've been with him a number of places, which has always helped," Shanahan said. "That's why I respect him so much as a coach, as a person. But I think the most [impressive thing] with Raheem is going against him at the Rams. I've been with him where he's done different defenses ... Raheem came in, did his scheme similar to [Brandon] Staley's completely, I thought added to it though, did some different things and kind of made of its own."
Now that Morris and Shanahan are working together again in San Francisco, that 2021 season with Morris in charge of the Rams' defense can be instructive in assessing what Morris might do with San Francisco's defense.
The Niners' fifth coordinator in as many years, Morris has been something of a chameleon coordinator, having experience leading defenses of multiple philosophies, fronts and coverages. His words and history suggest he prefers to tailor his scheme to his players rather than trying to fit square pegs in round holes.
Morris takes over a defense that was 13th in the NFL in scoring defense (21.8 points per game) but ranked 25th in defensive efficiency (43.69), 24th in defensive expected points added (minus-62.22) and yards per play (5.6), and tied for 23rd in takeaways (16).
He will also be tasked with supercharging a pass rush that was easily the worst in the league last year, finishing last in sacks (20), 31st in pressures (157) and 29th in pass rush win rate (29.2%).
Although the returns of star defensive end Nick Bosa and promising bookend Mykel Williams from torn ACLs and the addition of disruptive tackle Osa Odighizuwa should help significantly, Morris' hope is that mixing things up will also help across the board.
"You've got to have some multiplicity in your front," Morris said. "You've got to have multiplicity in the back end. You've got to be able to do different things. You'd like to be able to do those things when you decide to do those things and use them as terms where you can dictate, so to speak."
In Atlanta the past two seasons, Morris' defense deployed the third-most five-man fronts in the league, whereas the Niners "dibbled and dabbled a little bit" with it, according to Morris.
Given the personnel in place, however, Morris doesn't sound like he's planning to veer way off course from the traditional four-man fronts the Niners have favored under previous defensive coordinators Robert Saleh and DeMeco Ryans.
San Francisco traded for Odighizuwa specifically to fill a need for a pass-rushing 3-technique defensive tackle and drafted Gracen Halton to play a similar role. The curveball, however, might come from third-round pick Romello Height.
Height is listed at 6-foot-2, 239 pounds and played on the edge at Texas Tech. The 49ers haven't traditionally used smaller rushers under Shanahan, but it's not difficult to connect the dots from Height to players like the Rams' Byron Young and Atlanta's Jalon Walker in terms of how Morris might use him to change things up.
"He is somewhat of a tweener," Shanahan said. "There's lots of varieties you can do with him. Raheem has a ton of experience in doing that. We'll see how he does use him."
Since his arrival in February, Morris said he has been spending most of his time evaluating the players the Niners already have on the roster. He pointed to Bosa and linebacker Fred Warner as building blocks he will lean on as he attempts to integrate his ideas into the scheme that has been in place for nearly a decade.
Morris said he will aim to let players such as Warner and Bosa continue doing what they do best while also pushing them to expand their games in ways that will make them better.
"We definitely want to do what's best for our players," Morris said. "You're always going to do what they do really well. Fred Warner is Fred Warner for a reason. I'm going to try to utilize those guys to the best of their ability to do some of their different things and be able to have some additions, to be able to go out there and ultimately to go try to win a championship. Whatever's required, whatever's needed to go do those things. Those are the expectations and those are the things that we want to get done.
"So, to say it's going to be more resemblant to me or more resemblant to them, it's going to be what's best for us in order to go win football games."
Of course, the 49ers are still in the early stages of the offseason program and haven't even begun OTAs. Until those begin, there's only so much that can be known about Morris' plans for the defense.
"Just with early conversations with him, it sounds like a lot of stuff will be similar," Warner said. "But time will obviously tell."
