The 49ers easily manhandled a terrible Carolina Panthers team 20-9 on Monday Night Football, but everyone’s talking about a dirty punch to the unmentionables of Niners’ Jauan Jennings’s that set off a post-game fracas.

Your San Francisco 49ers had their first Monday Night Football game of the year last night, a largely unremarkable 20-9 win over the Carolina Panthers that was just the 49ers doing what good teams are supposed to do against bad teams.  But the scene immediately after the game was quite remarkable, as 49ers receiver Jauan Jennings took a swing at Panthers safety Tre'von Moehrig during what are normally just collegial postgame handshakes, and bizarrely had to be restrained (and tackled!) by his own teammates and assistant coaches.

What was Jennings's deal? Well, the internet did its thing. By the time Sportscenter With Scott Van Pelt came on, video sleuths had found footage showing that the Panthers’ Moehrig had delivered a dirty punch late in the game right smack-dab at Jennings’s gonads.

Jennings did not immediately retaliate when the incriminating nut-punch happened on a throwaway two-yard Christian McCaffrey run with 2:34 left in the game. Instead, Jennings wisely saved his retaliation for after the game, when he would not get a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.

And it does not sound like Jauan Jennings is in coach Mike Shanahan’s doghouse because of this postgame outburst. “The guy took a cheap shot and hit him in the balls,” Shanahan said after the game. “I was real proud of Jauan for not losing his mind out there.”

Still, Jennings could face a fine, or even a suspension from this Sunday's game against Cleveland.

But about the game! The red-dye-haired Jennings himself kicked off the scoring in this one, as the 49ers ran a long opening drive that took 8:43 of the clock, and ended with Jennings refusing to be tackled on a 12-yard touchdown pass from Brock Purdy. New emergency replacement kicker Matt Gay made the extra point, and was 4-4 on the night with two made field goals and two made extra points. So that’s a relief indicating we do not have a blundering kicker at the moment.

But people, this was bad football all night. Brock Purdy would be picked off on the very first play of the next 49ers drive (on a pass intended for Jauan Jennings), leaving the Panthers deep in 49ers territory for what appeared to be an easy score.

Yet the bumbling Panthers would not score. Instead, they threw their own interception right into the hands of the 49ers’ Ji'Ayir Brown.

How inept were these Carolina Panthers? Here’s Christian McCaffrey just fumbling it right to them deep in 49ers territory in the mid-second quarter. But the Panthers were just plain unable to fall on the ball, and the Niners picked up a tidy 15 yards simply by virtue of McCaffrey’s fumble.  

Yet that drive would end with… another Brock Purdy interception! Though none of this mattered, because the Panthers were not able to score any points off these spectacular mishaps.  

Until they were. Purdy’s third interception in just the first half led to a Panthers field goal that made this game 10-3. But that was as close as Carolina would be able to get for the rest of the game.

The 49ers added another second-half touchdown and field goal, while the Panthers would just throw interceptions and miss field goals in the second half. Frankly, a better team would have probably beaten these 49ers Monday night, what with all of their interceptions and fumbles and roughing-the-snapper penalties (roughing the snapper?). Still, the 49ers head into Thanksgiving with a very respectable 8-4 record, and right in the thick of the playoff race.

But a very respectable 8-4 record is only good enough for third place in the NFC West right now. The Niners are a full game-and-a-half behind the LA Rams, who are looking awfully goddamn good at the moment.

Yet the 49ers maintain their hold on the seventh and final playoff spot in the NFC. And they benefit from a relatively easy schedule these next couple weeks.

This Sunday the 49ers visit the dreadful Cleveland Browns, in what will be a 10 am PT morning game. Yes, the Browns just won a game with Deion Sanders’s kid Shadeur Sanders making his first start. But that was against the Raiders, who are probably the worst team in the NFL right now.

Young Shadeur Sanders will be up against something entirely different when he faces the Niners defense Sunday. But if he somehow leads the 3-8 Browns to a win Sunday over the 49ers, well… that would just be nuts.  

Related: 49ers Demolish Cardinals 41-22 In Brock Purdy’s Glorious Return [SFist]

Image: SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA - NOVEMBER 24: Jauan Jennings #15 of the San Francisco 49ers is separated from Tre'von Moehrig #7 of the Carolina Panthers after the game at Levi's Stadium on November 24, 2025 in Santa Clara, California. (Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)