The 49ers talked trash after losing to the Eagles in the championship game. Fred Warner wishes they hadn’t.
The 49ers linebacker is done making excuses.
With the trash talk between the Eagles and 49ers ramping up ahead of Sunday’s NFC championship game rematch, some of San Francisco’s players are taking the opposite approach.
“People are going to jump to what happened last year, in the NFC championship game,” linebacker Fred Warner said on his podcast, The Warner House. “I’m kind of over that whole thing. I know some of our players, throughout the offseason, were saying stuff about it. I honestly wish we hadn’t. You can sit there and make the excuse about the whole Brock [Purdy] situation, blah blah blah. At the end of the day, they beat us. They earned that.”
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Over the offseason, several Niners players, most notably wide receiver Deebo Samuel, called out the Eagles and stated that they believed they would have won the game if not for injury issues that, most notably, left them with an injured fourth-string Josh Johnson at quarterback.
The Birds beat the 49ers 31-7, and were up 7-0 before Purdy was knocked out of the game with a torn UCL. But Purdy and Johnson weren’t the only two players who struggled with injuries in the game. Edge rusher Nick Bosa also had an injury scare in the game, as he was taken down while standing on the sideline and had to receive medical attention but ultimately remained in the game. He didn’t register a single sack or quarterback hurry while going against Lane Johnson.
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But Bosa, like Warner, is turning the page ahead of the rematch at Lincoln Financial Field. He told KNBR on Tuesday he wasn’t much of a trash talker and told reporters the following day the Eagles have “some of the best tackles we’ll face, probably the best O-line we’ll face.”
“Last year, it’s over with,” Bosa told reporters Wednesday. “Neither team finished the job so it’s not like they’re looking back and reminiscing on an NFC championship win, either. We were both sad at the end of the year. We both have aspirations to win Super Bowls, so it’s a new year and this is a big step for both of us to get to that aspiration.”