ORLANDO, Fla. -- As problems for an NFL team go, fumbling is one of the easiest to identify. Logically, that would also make it one of the easiest to fix.

Just hold on to the ball, right? Sounds simple enough, but for the San Francisco 49ers that task has proved more difficult than not through the first 11 weeks. Including tight end Garrett Celek's costly fumble in Miami's red zone in Sunday's 31-24 loss, the Niners have now lost 11 fumbles this season. That ties them with the San Diego Chargers for the most in the NFL.

For those who struggle with math (I'm one of those so somebody double check me on this), that's an average of one fumble lost in every game the Niners have played. For a team with an already thin margin for error, such mistakes have had a significant impact on the team's 10-game losing streak.

"(It's) huge," Celek said. "Especially when you're in the red zone and you make a mistake like that, it hurts the team a lot, especially when they get the ball and they run down and score a touchdown."

To be sure, there's always some luck involved when it comes to fumbles lost as the ball can bounce any number of different ways. Sometimes it goes out of bounds, sometimes it comes back to the fumbler and sometimes it drops right into the hands of a defender.

In the Niners' case, though, things seem to be evening out, because while they are tied for most lost fumbles, they have put the ball on the ground more than the rest of the league. They have 22 fumbles through 11 games, which means they've lost half and recovered the other half.

It's an issue that actually plagued the Niners in the preseason and has carried over despite coach Chip Kelly's insistence on trying to quell the problem before the season started.

“It's a simple deal," Kelly said. "When the play starts, you've got to finish with the ball. It's a league that tries to strip you, to take the ball away from you. I think we understand that. We work on it but there's no excuse for fumbling.”

That number of fumbles clearly indicates the issue can't just be boiled down to one person who needs to fix it. As you'd expect, the quarterback and running back are guilty the most but there's also an alarming distribution of fumbles up and down the roster.

Quarterback Colin Kaepernick has fumbled six times but only lost two of those, making him the only player on the roster with more than one lost fumble. That's right, the other nine fumbles lost have come from nine different places. Receiver/punt returner Jeremy Kerley has fumbled four times but only lost one. Celek, running backs Carlos Hyde, DuJuan Harris, Mike Davis and Shaun Draughn, kick returner Chris Davis and receivers Aaron Burbridge and Keshawn Martin are responsible for the rest with one each.

After his fumble last week, Celek took the blame, saying he would put the onus on himself for the loss. Asked what needed to be done to correct the problem, Celek said it's easy enough to know what to do but it's just a matter of doing it every single time.

"I caught the ball like 10 yards from the quarterback, turned, saw three defenders so I went down," Celek said. "I should have put two hands on it but I didn't, but whoever came in from the side put his helmet right on the ball and knocked it out.

"It's just focusing. Usually whenever I catch the ball I get two hands on it but for some reason I didn't that time and I regret it."

For a team with an already razor-thin margin of error, the fumbles are only making things more difficult.

"As a whole we can't turn the ball over and win football games," Kaepernick said. "We can't have penalties that stop drives for us. As a whole we have to be on top of those things and cut out those mistakes in order to win football games."