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Watch: 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo speaks at a post-game press conference.

If securing a win is all that matters, the 49ers can be proud of their performance Sunday.

They started the season 1-0 after beating the Buccaneers 31-17 in Florida.

But if context matters in any way — and it should — then the Niners’ performance was uninspiring at best and wholly inadequate at worst.

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JIMMY VS. JAMEIS: Breaking down the good and the bad for each Sunday

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It’s only one game, so perhaps their sloppy play can be chalked up to first-game jitters. Or maybe the Niners were merely playing down to their competition.

But if Sunday’s play was, indeed, indicative of what we can expect from the Niners in the 2019 season, then this team won’t come close to making the playoffs for the first time since 2013.

San Francisco was merely the second-worst team in a contest that was worthy of a consolation bracket or the preseason. They had boneheaded penalties, lackluster execution, and questionable coaching, but the Buccaneers found a way to one-up their ineptitude across the board.

Tampa Bay was so bad on Sunday that it’s truly difficult to evaluate the one area the Niners possibly showed quality.

San Francisco’s defense only had seven takeaways all of last season, but they turned the Buccaneers over four times in Week 1, including returning two interceptions for touchdowns.

But was that a byproduct of year-to-year improvement for the Niners’ defense or was it because they went a Bucs offensive line that could well be the worst in the NFL, playing in front of unquestionably one of the worst starting quarterbacks in the league?

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STUDS & DUDS: Here are the wins and losses behind the 49ers’ 31-17 victory in Tampa

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We’ll need more time to find out. Sadly, the Niners will not play Tampa Bay again this season.

There’s no need to question if the Niners’ offensive performance was real, though.

Going up against a defense pegged to be one of the worst in the NFL this season, San Francisco was only able to score one touchdown and average 4.3 yards per play. They failed to score a touchdown when inside of Tampa Bay’s 20-yard line (a bugaboo from last year, too), had three touchdowns negated by offensive penalties, and quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo was more liability than asset.

It’s that last one that should have 49ers’ fans worried.

This is Garoppolo’s third season in the Bay Area. The team hopes that it will be the first where he plays all 16 games. But if Sunday’s performance is a harbinger of things to come, he will not hold onto his job for long.

Garoppolo proved incapable of completing the most basic and integral passes in head coach Kyle Shanahan’s offense Sunday, despite receiving more than adequate protection and Shanahan calling plays that left otherwise pedestrian receivers wide open.

Tampa Bay became wise to the situation early on, committing extra bodies to stop the run — San Francisco averaged a poor 3.1 yards per carry — because they knew that Garoppolo wouldn’t be able to take advantage by throwing the ball downfield.

Garoppolo attempted 27 passes Sunday. Only three of those attempts went further than 15 yards downfield. Eight of his 18 completions (of which only one was deeper than 10 yards — a nice touchdown throw to Richie James, 24 yards downfield) came behind the line of scrimmage.

His first-half interception (which was returned for a touchdown) was junior varsity — he locked onto one receiver and never wavered. The Tampa Bay defender read him like a drive-thru menu and scored with ease that should be impossible at the NFL level. This, on top of at least half-a-dozen passes to open receivers that he flat-out missed.

Another great play call, another instance of botched execution from the quarterback. pic.twitter.com/iwLhM2p9gQ — Dieter Kurtenbach (@dieter) September 8, 2019

Garoppolo’s performance was so underwhelming that you can’t help but think that his head coach lost faith in his quarterback’s to execute the game’s initial offensive plan and simplified things, as to ensure that at least San Francisco would not turn the ball over for the remainder of the game.

It worked, even though teams simply cannot win in the modern, pass-happy NFL, with such unthreatening tactics — not unless they’re going up against a quarterback who will throw three interceptions and a team that will fumble the ball three times, that is.

"We don't know much about Jimmy Garoppolo other than he has a bad habit of throwing the ball to the other team." pic.twitter.com/MqY50JJipG — Dieter Kurtenbach (@dieter) September 8, 2019

The Niners are an enigmatic team — a squad that theoretically has the talent to make the postseason but has underperformed under Shanahan.

It’s Year Three, but we’re still trying to figure out what to make of these guys. Are they for real this time around?

One game does not make a season, but despite that notch in the win column Sunday, the early returns are not good.