Know Your Enemy: Stevie Johnson & Anquan Boldin

The St. Louis Rams will be hosting the San Francisco 49ers on Monday Night Football. There are many key players that the Rams will have to keep an eye on if the Rams are going to pull off an upset on Monday night.

Two of those players happen to be 49ers wide receivers Stevie Johnson & Anquan Boldin.

Boldin is a 34-year-old receiver that has been playing at a high level for his entire career. The 49ers are the third team that Boldin has played for and last season the receiver surpassed 1,000 receiving yards and 7 touchdowns. Boldin is currently having a solid season with 303 receiving yards and two touchdowns so far.

Johnson is a 28-year-old year old castaway from the Buffalo Bills, who decided that they were going to have a youth movement in their receiving corp and sent the receiver to the 49ers prior to the beginning of the season. It seemed like a great move for the 49ers, adding a young talent to solidify their receiver corps. So how has the move fared so far for the 49ers? Well Johnson only has 183 yards in the season so far. The majority of those yards came against the Arizona Cardinals, he would finish his day with 9 receptions and 103 yards.

On paper this is a great matchup for the Rams. The 49ers are 26th in the league when it comes to passing yards in a game with 207, however the Rams are currently number one when it comes to defending the pass in yards allowed per game. The Rams can thank their cornerbacks Janoris Jenkins and rookie E.J. Gaines for that ranking since they have played at such a high level lately.

So why should these two players worry you? The slot position.

Both of these two players can play in the slot receiver role, which means they can attack where the Rams are currently at their weakest, in the middle of the defense. Rookie Lamarcus Joyner has been pretty poor recently holding slot receivers and this week could poise a real challenge for the youngster.