Despite being in trade rumors going into the draft, Jimmy Garoppolo remains a 49er. The soon-to-be 30-year-old quarterback now looks set, with the team having drafted North Dakota State one-year starter Trey Lance, to enter another season as San Francisco’s starting quarterback.
The 49ers are also not shutting the door on Garoppolo keeping his job into 2022. While this would be highly unusual for a modern first-round QB, especially one the 49ers traded two future first-round picks for, CEO Jed York said the Garoppolo-in-2022 scenario has come up at team headquarters.
“We’ve talked about this internally,” York said during an appearance on 49ers Talk with Matt Maiocco and Laura Britt (via NBC Sports). “If we’re in a situation where Jimmy goes out and takes us to a Super Bowl again and has an MVP-caliber season, and does it again, there are worse dilemmas to be in. And Jimmy certainly has the ability to do that.
“Knowing it’s the most important position in sports, and it’s great to have a guy that you do believe in and has gotten you to a Super Bowl. So you don’t have to put the weight of the world on a rookie, whoever it was we were going to choose.”
Few first-round quarterbacks since the Packers’ Brett Favre-to-Aaron Rodgers transition have failed to take over starting jobs as rookies, let alone second-year passers. In every non-Rodgers case, a first-round pick having failed to seize the job by Year 2 signaled a bust. Garoppolo sat for three-plus seasons behind Tom Brady, but the Patriots selected him in the 2014 second round. Garoppolo piloted the 49ers to Super Bowl LIV, throwing 27 touchdown passes in 2019, but has been unreliable from a health standpoint since coming to San Francisco. This led to the team trading up for Lance.
The 49ers would save $25.6MM by moving on from Garoppolo in 2022, which still should be considered the likely scenario. Garoppolo’s salary remaining on the books will prevent the 49ers from capitalizing on a rookie QB contract, which has become a valuable roster-building tool since the 2011 CBA reshaped rookie deals. Lance only attempted 318 passes in college, declaring for the draft ahead of his COVID-19-nixed sophomore season.
As they should be. Lance was drafted for his first round potential, not his current ability. No matter who he will be as a quarterback, however, we all at least need to remember that it has been over a year since Lance has played multiple games. At best, he’s going to need time to reacclimate to the grind of a full season, even if by some chance he does not need time to acclimate to the NFL.
The 9ers have a good QB starting now, whose main issue is availability. If Garappolo goes down again, it’ll just give Lance an opportunity. There’s no rush on the 9ers’ end, and there shouldn’t be.
If he is the starter two seasons from now then what an awful pick by SF to get Lance.
Yeah, but my comment wasn’t necessarily directed towards the Lance pick. It’s mostly directed to being comfortable with Garappolo starting for a couple of years while they find their next QB. Lance wouldn’t have been my choice, but he’s there now, and he’s not ready. They need someone now, and Garappolo is a good option to start and certainly can be for longer than a season.
It’s not an awful pick if he starts two seasons from now. That’s exactly like saying the Rodgers pick was a bust because he didn’t start immediately. They took Lance because he might have the highest ceiling. The idea that you should let draft position and not the development of the player dictate when a player has to start is not only dumb it’s irresponsible. Let him develop and set him up to succeed.
Oh but you can’t do that when you’re a step away from a SB win, haven’t you heard? At least not in THIS case. But it was OBVIOUSLY stupid for the Packers to do the exact same thing on a far cheaper scale with Love a year ago. Lynch & the Niners are geniuses for doing it, though.
Love and Lance are nowhere near the same level, and neither are Rodgers and Jimmy Garappolo. Those situations are completely different.
Pay attention. This isn’t about Love’s value versus Lance (and articles are coming out now Lance is JUST as raw as Love was), what this IS about is the crap the Packers have heard since that pick: ‘Oh, look at the idiots that were one player from winning a super bowl trading up to get a QB they won’t need for 2 years while not getting their QB any help to win one’ Nobody is giving SF that same treatment when they were IN the freaking dance a year ago and are openly saying Lance may not do anything for 2 years after giving up the farm to get him (while GB didn’t give up nearly that much for Love), why is that exactly?
GB didn’t spend three first round draft picks on Rodgers, either.
Sounds great!
Let’s take him with the third pick in the first round, and let’s spend three first round picks, this year’s and trade the next two year’s plus a third round pick, and then let him sit on the bench the next two years behind our overpaid, ineffective starting QB while his trade value continues to decline. Let’s make the Bears look less incompetent for trading up like they did a few years back for Trubisky. Awesome plan!
Truth is Jimmy is having a great career! Handsome man, well spoken, and multi-millions (should be) in the bank. He can ‘walk away’ now and still get TV gigs for the next 30 years. But the reality is teams BEG for a starting QB, so he can be a QB another 7-9 years and bank more!
Lance hasn’t played in a year and has attempted 318 passes in his entire college career, that’s substantially less than one full time NFL QB would attempt in a season. There is no way he is ready for the NFL and he really hasn’t done anything to warrant his draft position. I could be wrong but Lance is the Deshone Kizer of this years draft.
That seems a *bit* harsh.
I agree. Kizer actually proved to be a very good college QB at a high level. Lance has Akili Smith written all over him.
Akili Smith? C’mon, Seattle- I know you got no hit today, but don’t whiff this bad on an NFL projection.
Absolutely smoke screen by Lynch to try and get someone to trade for Jimmy. Trading 3 first round picks for a guy you want to play two years from now is beyond an awful move.
If Jimmy G gets bit by the injury bug again, Lance will likely start. Unless Rosen evolves into what he was touted to be.
Can you not see that SF cannot afford to let that happen? They are on the hook for JGs ridiculously bloated contract. They cannot risk him going out there for them next season and getting injured and forfeiting any opportunity to mitigate at least some of the expense of his burdensome contract.
Right now, he could be traded at some value, even if it’s not enough to wipe out the entire cost. If he is injured again, no one will ever trade for him. They just can’t publicly express that they are willing to trade him and then hope to get top dollar in return. He has to seem unavailable in order to motivate a higher trade value. It’s simple supply and demand theory, and people placing higher value on what they seemingly cannot have.
Furthermore, you don’t rationally mortgage the future and spend three first round picks on a project QB. If they did, that was completely irresponsible and gross mismanagement. Because of not wanting to look foolish, Lance is going to start.
SF went all-in on Lance, pre-flop, whether or not it was a good decision. They are not going to fold, because now they have to stay in and ride this hand out. Even if nothing about his resumé thus far even remotely supports the notion that he is guaranteed to become a franchise QB, ever, let alone a player worth three first round picks. Might he be? Perhaps. Anything is possible. My guess is that Lance was the player that they evaluated to be most similar to Mahomes, and they are trying to catch lightning in a bottle and desperately trying to make amends for foolishly, in hindsight, not drafting him when they had the chance, and didn’t want to get burned again by missing out on Lance, if they are right.
They very well might luck out, and maybe we’ll find out they held pocket aces and a low face card with JG, flopped another ace, and then two more on the turn and river. We will see on the call about Lance. Whatever happens with him, they are definitely bluffing when it comes to JG.
My prediction is that they were betting on the full house or two pairs, and they are going to bust out and be the bad beat.
I can tell you right now lance is a bust, imagine trading 3 firsts for that guy lol. Not even close to lawerence
Time will tell, Tornado of Terror.
Too bad the Jags will always suck. It is in their DNA. Lawerence will have career ending injury and the Jags will be irrelevant for another 27 years.
Well, that’s just as dumb a statement as him declaring Lance a bust out of the gate.
No rush.
So many sports writers/TV commentaters/experts came up with the “traded 3 first round picks” take. As if it’s clever or some original thought. It’s nonsense. And now commenter here are repeating it. Please stop. It’s not clever.
I’m pretty sure they drafted 3rd in the first round. They still had that pick and now have no first round picks the next 2 years. 2 first round d picks traded.
LOL what? It’s not a take, thought or nonsense. It’s a fact. They traded three 1st round picks to move up. Ultimately doing it for a 1st round pick doesn’t cancel out one they gave up. That was the cost to move up to the #3 pick. Guess the facts are too difficult for 49er fans to handle.
“So many sports writers/TV commentaters/experts came up with the “traded 3 first round picks” take.”
You mean they’re reporting a fact?
When you trade a pick you don’t have it anymore. And my questioning the verbiage has nothing to do with my Fandom. They traded 2 first round picks and SWAPPED this years pick. Swap does not equal trade. You both are wrong
There have been several other football experts, Peter King and Greg Cosell to name two, that have stated specifically that to say 3 first round picks were not traded. And they don’t see why it’s being said. A same round swap is not a trade.
From the dictionary: swap (verb) take part in an exchange of. “we swapped phone numbers”
synonyms:
bandy · exchange · trade
A same round swap is not a trade? So if I traded my 1st for your 1st it wouldn’t be a trade? Or how about if I traded you my 1st and 3rd to move up for your 1st…by your logic, I acquired a 1st round pick for a 3rd
“The 49ers traded first round picks in 2021, 2022 and 2023 to Miami and move up #3 overall”. They traded THREE 1st round picks. Once again this is a fact. “Swapping” their picks this year still counts. Where did you get the idea that moving your own pick doesn’t matter as long as you move up?
Whatever!
Traded. Swapped. Gave up. Mortgaged the future.
Lance cost them three first round picks. Period.
It’s not a matter of how you want to characterize the transaction to include that first round pick that they already possessed for this year. That’s really irrelevant.
Lance cost the 49ers three first round picks, no matter how you slice it.
Only time will tell if it was a good decision.
On the surface, based on the known facts, it is reasonable to question if he was worth that steep of a cost. It is not unreasonable to wonder if he truly can pan out to be such a great QB that his ultimate value exceeds what they could have gotten either at the position of their original 2021 draft slot, or even at another higher 2021 slot, but lower than the third pick, that they might have negotiated at a lower cost than including two future first round picks, plus the potential values of the two future first round pick players which they will never have the opportunity to draft now. That’s a huge burden to place on Lance, and past history has proven that it is rare that such a deal ever pays dividends equal to what was sacrificed.
When viewed from that perspective, it is unreasonable to expect us to believe that they spent that much on a player that they do not evaluate as having immediate value and who is unable to contribute to the team, right now. If that is true, then it is understandable that the opinion exists that investing three first round picks for Lance was gross mismanagement. None of the players cited as examples to support this decision, who sat for a year or two before starting and then became successful, cost their teams three first round picks, plus a third round pick. Name me one player, ever, at any position, who was taken at number three, and cost their team two future first round picks, plus a third, who didn’t start almost immediately.
Either SF is bluffing about JG continuing to start for two more years, or they made a very bad decision, because you just don’t spend that much for a project QB.
They basically are okay with Jimmy for now and by the time his contract is up they believe Lance will be poised to take over and they won’t miss a beat. And they traded the firsts BC next years class doesn’t do anything for them and it’s one less year in the system to create the smooth transition. The compromise is wasting 2 years of control in addition to the picks. Bears gave up a lot for Fields just to get to 10. If the 49ers are drafting 25-31 the next 2 years they won’t be able to get up high enough to get that successor QB. When was the last time someone traded out of the Top-5 to 25th or beyond?
Trey Lance is 20 years old and has barely played above high school. 2 years of learning the system might be a good idea.
Sure, if they took him in the third or lower rounds, not the third overall pick, and didn’t spend three first round, and a third round, picks on him. Then again, why would a team ever spend that much draft capital on any player who, as you said, “is 20 years old and has barely played above high school?”
GENIUS, I tell you! GENIUS!
Just a couple seasons ago not one FBS program thought he’d be able to contribute as a QB within his 4-5 years there so he ended up at FCS NDSU. After not being able to play his 1st year there he took over in year 2 and had a great season followed up by 1 below average game this past fall. That some of these teams were willing to take him where he went in that time is beyond ridiculous. His quality of competition was less than ideal, but the quantity of competition was ridiculously low. He has huge bust written all over him.
The 49’ers are in a perfect position to let Lance grow into the starter role, so why not do it? The only people throwing shade on this idea are fans of the other quarterback draftees who wanted their favorite to be in this position.
The only people throwing shade on this are the people who are smart enough to realize that you don’t spend three first round picks, plus a third round pick, on a project QB.
The 49ers front office people must think football fans are gullible idiots. No one with a brain is buying their narrative. They absolutely do not want Jimmy but they put themselves in jail by giving him that contract. Now they’re trying to con everyone into thinking they are delighted with Jimmy…lol.
There’s like no dead money on this deal.
So, let’s see here:
A year ago, the Packers go get their guy late in the draft in Love to do this exact same thing with, costing EXPONENTIALLY less to do so and ever since, they’re branded ‘idiots’ by the geniuses out there on message boards and draft expert talk. Now, San Fran deals a TON of their future draft equity to do the exact same thing at a massively higher price tag, and they’re supposedly geniuses for it? Uh huh.
Again, Love and Lance were hardly the same prospect. Again, Rodgers and Garappolo are hardly the same starter. Just because they have the same letters by their positions doesn’t mean they’re all equal.
And, again, the Packers weren’t stupid to draft a replacement. They were stupid for ignoring their blaring, blatant needs to do so when they were so close to going to the championship. And they were stupid for trading up for a questionable prospect that they didn’t even believe was the second best quarterback on their own team.
So, by your logic: Packers are stupid for ignoring clear needs while being so close to a championship but the ‘Niners (who actually were IN one a year ago) are NOT for doing the exact same thing at an exponentially higher cost to do so? Well that makes sense.
And again, go back and look at the predraft grades. Some guys had Love ABOVE Herbert going in there as a top 3 predraft graded QB. Absolutely ZERO difference between Love and Lance in terms of being raw and needing time to grow. The difference is that GB got attacked and mocked while here, SF is viewed as geniuses for drafting a higher priced player. It’s complete garbage.