Jimmy Garoppolo

Holding on to a 10-0 lead with nine minutes left in the second quarter, Garoppolo held court on the 49ers’ sideline to try and get his offensive compatriots going. It worked.

Sunday night was billed as a competition between two titans of the National Football Conference.

The 49ers are lucky they played the Arizona Cardinals. Over the course of the next six games, they are unlikely to escape with a win in spite of such a dispassionate performance as the one they displayed in Sunday’s first quarter.

For the 49ers, some 8-1 starts are better than others.

The story of this week was how the 49ers were about to return at least three of their key players in Mike McGlinchey, Joe Staley and Kyle Juszczyk.

Jimmy Garoppolo didn’t just turn heads with his play during Thursday night’s win over the Arizona Cardinals.

When the 49ers needed him most,(which was the whole game) Jimmy Garoppolo was there.

You couldn’t ask for an uglier game. Playing on field that was more mud than grass, the 49ers and the Redskins ran the ball at each other 30-plus times each, but it was the 49ers defense, which, yet again, was superb, that led the way in a 9-0 win.

The 49ers are 5-0, so it seems like a perfect time to start complaining.

Everyone surrounding the 49ers these days is walking around like we just got out of the dentist’s office on laughing gas — light-headed, smiling, feeling no pain.