The San Francisco 49ers, after a slow start under head coach Kyle Shanahan, appeared ready to fight their way back into the playoffs, as they have done several times before.
They started Week 11 5-4, and a win over the Seattle Seahawks would have tied them in the NFC West and put them on the heels of a wild-card berth if their division hopes had failed.
Instead, they lost 20-17 at Levi's Stadium, making the relatively clear path to the postseason much murkier.
Here are the 49ers' spots in the NFC West after Sunday:
1. Cardinals (6-4)
2. Rams (5-5)
3. Seahawks (5-5)
4. 49ers (5-5)
While this doesn't seem so bad on the surface, we have to consider the reality that the 49ers aren't playing well enough to believe they'll win the rest of their games. If they did that, they would be in a great position.
Unfortunately, this season has shown us that these are not the 49ers teams of recent history (read: last season).
So what we have is a team that can now, at best, share with any team in the division. If they can do that, they will be 3-3 overall in the NFC West. The problem is that the division record is the first tiebreaker after head-to-head matchups. In our scenario, the 49ers would tie for the division record with any team they tied, and going 3-3 probably won't reach it.
To win the NFC West, the 49ers must now make such a breakthrough that they avoid a tiebreaker scenario. Given the difficulties this club has faced since Week 2, we're not ready to rely on that just yet.
Maybe there's a run in there. Maybe injuries hit other teams or they start playing poorly later in the year and the 49ers post a string of wins in their final seven games. That would change the bill.
However, where they sit after a Week 11 loss to the Seahawks, the path to the postseason via winning the division looks bleaker than it has in a long time.
