SANTA CLARA — The fullback may be a dying breed in the NFL. Just don’t tell the 49ers or Vikings.
No teams utilized their fullbacks on more offensive snaps this season than the two who will face off in Saturday’s NFC Divisional Round game at Levi’s Stadium.
When Kyle Shanahan arrived in San Francisco, the 49ers went out and signed the top fullback on the market: Kyle Juszczyk.
“I like having a fullback because that’s the only way you can dictate your terms,” Shanahan said. “You always try to have the best player at each position, so we were pumped to get ‘Juice.'”
Juszczyk’s contributions can be obvious — a long reception here, a crucial block there — the role C.J. Ham plays for the Vikings can be a bit more mysterious but just as valuable.
Juszczyk has proven to be everything the 49ers hoped they were getting when they handed out the largest contract to a fullback in NFL history three years ago. His versatility is on display most weeks, but especially so in the 49ers’ Week 17 win in Seattle.
When Deebo Samuel took an end-around in the first half, it was Juszczyk leading the way. As Samuel turned the corner — before he pulled his own move on Tre Flowers to get into the end zone — Juszczyk took out two Seattle defenders at once.
Later on in the second half, on the first play after the Seahawks scored to pull within six points, Juszczyk sparked an immediate answer with a 49-yard grab that set up a 49ers touchdown four plays later. The key block on that two-yard TD rush? Yup, it was Juszczyk clearing a hole for Raheem Mostert.
“He makes the blocks easy — or at least look easy,” Mostert said, “even though he tells us they’re kind of hard.”
Ham, on the other hand, has been the quiet key to Dalvin Cook’s breakout season with the Vikings. Sometimes they’ll line up with two backs and a tight end, then split Ham out wide to clear the box. On others, the third-year fullback simply acts as the bulldozer paving the way to a career-high 1,135 yards and 13 touchdowns.
“To have someone like that, who is super athletic, super tough, super physical, leading the way for Dalvin, who is super athletic and physical himself, that’s a combination that you can’t beat,” Vikings running back Alexander Mattison told the Star Tribune this week.
Just like Juszczyk, Ham’s head-down production has earned him the respect of the locker room — even if some fans wouldn’t recognize his name.
After facing the Packers and their fullback, Danny Vitale, earlier this season, Juszczyk swapped jerseys after the game. He posted a photo captioned: “The fullback fraternity was alive and well last night.”
It is a shrinking fraternity, though. There are fewer and fewer players like Juszczyk and Ham and an even quicker-shrinking pool of available spots for them. The league has been moving away from the fullback for years as teams implement more four- and five-receiver sets. Just look at those left in the playoffs: the Ravens are the only other team to use their fullback on more than 16% of their offensive snaps.
“I don’t think people necessarily understand his job,” Mostert said. “They see his title as a fullback, but he’s much more than that. He’s a definite playmaker.”
Ham and Cook both joined the Vikings three seasons ago. Cook was a heralded first-round pick out of Florida State. Ham was an undrafted free agent from tiny Augustana University in South Dakota pulled up from the practice squad. But it wasn’t until Gary Kubiak took over Minnesota offense this season that the duo began to thrive.
It’s no fluke the 49ers and Vikings — both offensive schemes can be derived from the Mike Shanahan system. Kyle, obviously, as his son and former assistant. Kubiak as Shanahan’s longtime offensive coordinator with the Broncos.
The younger Shanahan explained why he prefers to buck the league trend.
“When you have a fullback in the game, if you really want to run the ball, you can run the ball regardless of what the defense is doing,” Shanahan said.
