Speculation and questions have dominated the 49ers quarterback conversation since the minute they traded up to No. 3 in the 2021 draft. Those questions didn’t stop when they drafted Trey Lance, and now they’re still roaring as the club gets ready to transition to their new signal caller.
A lot of those questions are driven by rumors and ‘what ifs.’ It’s understandable that the conversation about an NFL team’s uncertain quarterback situation has gotten loud after more than a year to talk about it. The volume and the length of the discussion has led to some of its basic facts to get buried. What should be driving the conversation is instead relegated to silence in a media cycle that thrives on takes.
So let’s look at what we know about the 49ers’ QB situation, and get to the basics to see if we can make a projection about how this all finally concludes:
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Jimmy Garoppolo’s contract
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There was a level of uncertainty when the 49ers inked Garoppolo to a five-year, $137.5 million deal with $48.7 million guaranteed. He’d started just seven games in the NFL, but led the 49ers to a 5-0 finish to close their dreary 2017 campaign. San Francisco built trap doors into Garoppolo’s contract that front-loaded his salary to make him cheaper to get rid of should things go south. That structure left the 49ers with just $1.4 million in dead cap if they move on from Garoppolo via trade or release. They’ll also save $25.55 million in cap space.
It’s hard to imagine they’d build these outs into Garoppolo’s deal, then when it came time to move on, they don’t take advantage of the team-friendly contract structure.
Big trade up for Trey Lance
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What’s gotten lost in the speculative discourse around Lance is that the 49ers mortgaged their future to move up for him. They shed their 2021, 2022 and 2023 first-round selections, along with a 2022 third-round choice. They did this because they were ready to move on from Garoppolo, and in 2021 the veteran didn’t do much to assuage the concerns about him as a franchise QB.
If there was a chance the 49ers were going to leave the door open on a Garoppolo return, they likely wouldn’t have made the biggest trade in franchise history to get a new QB in the building. Lance’s experience is certainly a concern, and there are question marks around the 22-year-old that can’t begin to be answered until he gets a full slate of NFL starts under his belt. The 49ers knew that would be the case when they selected him, and if uncertainty was going to be a problem that threw San Francisco’s long-term plan off track then they wouldn’t have (or at least shouldn’t have) gone with Lance in the first place.
Tried trading Garoppolo
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The 49ers have very publicly been trying to trade Garoppolo. General manager John Lynch and head coach Kyle Shanahan have both talked about this. Shanahan even said during OTAs in late May that the club still expected to trade him. Lynch said before the draft “there were certainly the various discussions that were at different places in terms of how far along, and (the shoulder surgery) certainly threw a wrench in those things.”
Garoppolo’s injury woes
(AP Photo/Tony Avelar)
One of the key issues Lynch and Shanahan cited last offseason when discussing their move up for a QB was Garoppolo’s inability to stay healthy. Injuries to Garoppolo derailed them in 2018 and 2020, and now a shoulder injury the QB suffered in the postseason is throwing a curveball at their offseason plans. He tried getting healthy without surgery, but finally chose to have the operation at a time that would allow him to be throwing before training camps opened.
The 49ers were looking to move on from Garoppolo because he was hurt too often, and then they were unable to trade him because he was hurt. Now the other QB jobs are all taken, leaving San Francisco with fewer options moving forward.
Nate Sudfeld factor
(AP Photo/Tony Avelar)
An under-the-radar aspect of the discussion on Garoppolo’s future is what the 49ers did with Sudfeld this offseason. He was on San Francisco’s practice squad all last year and worked as a backup in the two games Garoppolo missed due to injury. The 49ers brought Sudfeld back on a fully-guaranteed, one-year, $2 million contract. This doesn’t necessarily preclude San Francisco from going a different route at QB2, but it’s a strong indicator that the plan is for Sudfeld to remain in the building as Lance’s backup with seventh-round pick Brock Purdy operating as the third signal caller.
Brian Griese factor
(AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
The 49ers hired Brian Griese as their quarterbacks coach specifically to help Lance in his first season as a starting QB. As of mandatory minicamp, Griese hadn’t even spoken to Garoppolo, who was excused from the mandatory session as he rehabs his injured shoulder. Perhaps by early July there had been some contact between Griese and Garoppolo, but the last time the new QB coach spoke it didn’t sound like it was in his plans to work with the veteran signal caller.
Doing some math
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While the above facts don’t etch anything in stone, they certainly point to one conclusion to this saga. The 49ers gave Garoppolo a contract that made him cheap to part ways with in 2022, and in 2021 traded three first-round picks to climb up to No. 3 overall and draft a quarterback. Injuries were an impetus for that trade up, and the 49ers’ chances to trade Garoppolo dried up while he dealt with another injury (that may have hampered him in the team’s NFC championship game loss). San Francisco as part of its offseason paid backup QB Nate Sudfeld $2 million fully guaranteed and hired a new QB coach to work with Lance. That QB coach, last we heard, hadn’t talked to Garoppolo.
It’s nigh impossible to put all those pieces together and conclude that the 49ers are doing anything except trading or releasing Garoppolo once he’s healthy. They may not want to do the latter, but they may not have another choice.
San Francisco has time if they want to wait since Garoppolo’s $26.95 million don’t become guaranteed until Week 1 of the regular season, but Garoppolo may not be amenable to waiting around on the roster only to be let go right before the regular season starts. Perhaps he would take a pay cut to be the backup in camp in hopes of winning the starting job at some point to recoup some of his value heading into unrestricted free agency next offseason. If Garoppolo asks for his release though, the 49ers would be wise to grant it before extending this saga, which has been rife with rumors and speculation that fly in the face of some basic facts, any longer than it needs to go.
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