💥 BREAKING NEWS: Kyle Shanahan’s 2025 season is turning heads—could he finally claim the Coach of the Year crown everyone’s debating?.QQ
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Week 13 closed with an 8–4 record, the top of the NFC West, and a roster that most head coaches in the league would have surrendered to long ago. But Kyle Shanahan isn’t most coaches. He just led the San Francisco 49ers to a 27–17 win over the Seahawks without Brock Purdy, without Brandon Aiyuk, with a banged-up George Kittle, and with Nick Bosa and Fred Warner playing only half the game. In a season where nearly every star has battled injuries, Shanahan has kept his team functioning like a disciplined, resilient machine. “If this isn’t the Coach of the Year, then who is?” Colin Cowherd said last week — and the line has quickly become a rallying cry among 49ers fans.
What Shanahan has accomplished this season almost defies logic. He’s operating with the most injured roster in the NFL, according to the Man-Games Lost Index, yet his offense still averages 28.4 points per game — third best in the league. He revived Mac Jones, once labeled a “fallen prospect,” helping him win three of his last four starts with a passer rating over 100. He turned Joshua Dobbs from clipboard holder into a Monday Night Football winner. He elevated Isaac Guerendo, Ronnie Bell, and a cast of unheralded players into All-Pro-level contributors at the exact moments the team needed them most. No complaints, no drama — just a new playbook every week designed around whoever is still standing.
After the win over the Rams, Shanahan made a statement that has become the defining theme of the 49ers’ season: “I don’t care who we have. I care what we do with the ones we have left.” And the entire NFL is watching him prove that philosophy true. Coach of the Year often goes to the one who battles adversity — Kevin O’Connell with his 13–4 Vikings, Brian Daboll taking the Giants from 4–13 to the playoffs — but Shanahan is fighting a tougher war: keeping the 49ers in the NFC’s top three despite a level of injury attrition no contender has matched.
Kyle Brandt of NFL Network said it plainly: “He’s having the best coaching season of his career — maybe the best we’ve seen in twenty years.” And he’s not wrong. Shane Steichen has the Colts trending up. Dan Campbell has the Lions soaring. But neither is winning eight games with a roster this battered, this depleted, this constantly reshuffled. Every week, the 49ers look like a different team — and yet, every week, they still look like a winning one. That doesn’t happen without Shanahan.
Five games remain, but the question is no longer “Will Shanahan be among the finalists?” The only question left is: Who could possibly deserve it more? Coach of the Year 2025 already feels decided. And this time, no one will dare say Kyle Shanahan got “snubbed.”
