Barber: 49ers try to lower the temperature on expectations, just a bit

SANTA CLARA

Let’s get fired up about the 49ers’ final five games of 2017! But not too fired up. Like, sort of medium fired. Extremely warm, shall we say. Fired up enough to light a decent bed of charcoal, but definitely not enough to burn down the garage.

Welcome to training camp 2018, where the San Francisco 49ers would like to hearken back to last December just enough to sell a stack of tickets and GAROPPOLO jerseys, but not enough to create unreasonable goals for the coming season.

“It’s exciting to be able to build on something positive from last year and kind of carry it into the offseason,” left tackle Joe Staley said Wednesday. “But there’s no one in that locker room saying we’ve arrived or anything like that at all. We know we have a ton of work to do. We were a 6-10 football team at the end of the year last year.”

Staley was one of the 49ers trotted into the auditorium at Levi’s Stadium to mark the start of camp. Team meetings began Wednesday night. The first practice is today. Stuff’s getting real. Fairly soon, we will all see whether the home stretch of the ’17 season was real or Photoshopped.

The 49ers enter the summer in a rare position. They’re a 6-10 team with sky-high expectations. They finished in last place in the NFC West last year and drafted in the top 10. But by the time the playoffs began, they were the team everyone was glad they didn’t have to play, with a five-game winning streak and the hottest quarterback in the league.

So head coach Kyle Shanahan and his staff must walk a tightrope. They want to take advantage of the enthusiasm coursing through the building, without losing sight of the fact that Shanahan takes a losing record into Year 2 as a head coach.

In effect, Shanahan is like a scientist working a balky thermostat. He’s finding it hard to get the temperature exactly right: Up just a tad. No, down a hair. Ah, that’s it. Oops. CBS Sports’ Jason LaCanfora has named the 49ers one of his surprise teams of 2018. It’s getting hot in here again.

“It would be nice if not all you guys talked about it all the time,” Shanahan said. “I know it’s part of it, but … if our guys make a living just reading and listening to talk radio and stuff, that stuff could mess you up. Because I am aware that people have talked highly about us. That’s what comes with the territory when you win your last five games after starting so bad.”

The 49ers, or at least the “faces of the franchise” we heard from Wednesday, seem to get the perils of their situation.

“Going 5-0 into a playoff run and then doing damage is much different than going 5-0 after going 1-10,” said cornerback Richard Sherman, San Francisco’s new defensive leader. “I think guys understand that, and guys are focused on that right now, and making sure that they make this team. You rest on your reputation, and you’ll be resting at home this year.”

This perspective is relevant as we try to figure out just how good the 49ers are in July of 2018.

On the positive side of the ledger: The Niners have clearly found a franchise quarterback, and they wrapped him up with a lucrative long-term deal. They retain the services of Pierre Garcon, the No. 1 ?receiver who played just half the 2017 season before getting hurt. They signed a running back, Jerick McKinnon, who resembles the guys who ran wild when Shanahan was the offensive coordinator in Atlanta. A talented young secondary should benefit from Sherman’s wisdom. Linebacker Reuben Foster will miss the first two games under an NFL-mandated suspension, but is not in prison.

And on the negative side: This franchise hasn’t experienced a winning season since 2013. The offensive line is a work in progress. McKinnon was never deemed start-worthy in four years with the Vikings, but will now be called upon to bear much of the offensive load. There isn’t a proven pass rusher on the entire roster. Sherman may be a fantastic locker-room presence, but Achilles’ injuries are problematic; there is no guarantee he will return to Pro Bowl status.

All in all, the 49ers are still a team with as many questions as answers.

Now go explain that to the sports-talk-radio callers of the Bay Area, many of whom are scrolling through Expedia for January flights to Philadelphia and Minnesota, convinced the Niners are bound for the NFC championship game. The bar is suddenly much higher for this team.

“I know if we start off with a couple losses, that’ll be, ‘Oh, they thought they had arrived,’” Shanahan said. “We don’t think that at all. We were 6-10 last year. We won those last five games, and we weren’t just blowing guys out. I just mentioned all the young people we have. This can go a lot of ways. Every season’s hard.”

How hard? Jimmy Garoppolo may well lose a game this year. In fact, he is likely to lose several. The Las Vegas sportsbooks generally have the over/under for 49ers victories in 2018 at somewhere around 8.5 or 9. That sounds about right. I might even bet the under at 9 wins (if, you know, it were done legally and I donated my winnings to charity).

Those numbers put the 49ers on the fringe of the playoffs. Last year, NFC teams needed 10-6 to make the postseason. The year before that, one 9-7 team got in while one did not. In 2015, there was a 9-7 division winner but 10-6 was the minimum standard for wild-card teams.

Here’s what success looks like for the 49ers in 2018: a winning record, and still in playoff contention after a visit to Seattle in Week 13. Consider it a steppingstone to real contention in 2019, assuming the ShanaPlan is on schedule. A 2018 postseason game would be a huge bonus.

Sherman said the 49ers won’t know what they have until at least mid-August, when players have had a chance to respond to the mental and physical beat-down they will have absorbed in training camp.

“To say this is like a playoff team after three minicamp practices and some OTAs is reaching,” Sherman said. “I’d be hard-pressed to say we don’t look like a playoff team or we do, you know what I mean? I’d be lying.”

I wonder how modest improvement would be received by 49ers fans. A 9-7 season would have felt like winning the lottery a year ago. Now things are different. Now the stakes are higher. Now there are, gulp, expectations.

You can reach columnist Phil Barber at 707-521-5263 or phil.barber@pressdemocrat.com. Follow him on Twitter:?@Skinny_Post.