The San Francisco 49ers handily defeated the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday and looked impressive doing so. That was the good part. The bad part is both the Seattle Seahawks and Los Angeles Rams faced teams who lost their starting quarterbacks early. This didn’t make things easy, but that little handicap works to their favor. Especially when both of those injured quarterbacks are candidates for Canton.
And so there remains a 3-way tie for first place of the NFC West. Let’s look at what happened in the division.
Seattle Seahawks
The same Seahawks who struggled against the Bengals squad that the 49ers stomped got gifted a handicap when Pittsburgh Steelers starting quarterback Ben Roethlisberger left with an elbow injury and did not return.