San Francisco 49ers Forever

Pay the guy already.

• Aaron Donald is getting 3/$95 mill. That works out to $31.667 mill a year.
• TJ Watt is getting 4/$112 mill. $28 mill a year.
• Brother Joey Bosa is getting 4/$102 mill. $27 mill per.
• Myles Garrett is getting 5/$125 mill. $25 mill per.
• Khalil Mack is getting 6/$141. $23 mill per, but his $141 mill total leads the way.

It shouldn’t be too hard to sgn him for 5/$160 mill art $32 mill per season. Joey can’t even stay on the field and he gets a monster payday. Same with TJ Watt. Bosa had the one year lost to injury but otherwise has been there.

My guess would be the sticking points are guaranteed money and signing bonus money. These guys are all over the map. But, lordy, some might big numbers.

• Donald got $25 mill signing bonus, and a whopping $95 mill guaranteed.
• Watt – $35 mill, $80 mill guaranteed.
• J Bosa – $35 mill, $102 mill guaranteed (yikes)
• Garrett – $21 mill, $100 mill guarantees
• Mack – $34 mill, $90 mill guaranteed

Shit, Nick may just be going after brother Joey’s signing bonus. Thing is, you really can’t let this guy walk. He’s a generational player, and he should get his one monster deal, and then see where we are come 2028.

Tell ya one thing, the Watt brothers and the Bosa brothers could get together and buy the entire league. Just want this shot done so it isn’t a distraction like the Deebo holdout was last year.

Got to say, I love Grant Cohn if only for his moronic takes reporting on the 49ers. He ripped Kyle Shanahan after day 1 of practice last Thursday when the quarterbacks in the fold did pretty poorly. Purdy didn’t practice, Lance 10 (2-5), Darnold 8 (1-5) and Allen 4 (1-3). He railed at the stupidity of not giving Lance more reps. He railed that he’s stunting the progress of Lance. That Darnold shouldn’t get near as many as Lance.

It’s day one of camp, skippy.

These camp reports are still too much nonsense. From Nolan saying Smith is “‘”really getting the deep ball down” to Singleneuron saying “Gore gets the ball 50 times a game” to Harbaugh saying “Smith really has the deep ball down” to Jimmy bag-a donuts farting away his job, it’s all hot air and not worth the time it takes to read.

Other than that, I don’t know. But we have football in 9 days!!! The season is nigh!

These stupid ranking systems are as useful as the ether they are printed on, but this is pretty funny. No love for the 49ers Brock Purdy despite his strong showing coming off the bench as the 3rd string QB to lead the 49ers to (almost) the promised land.

Deshaun Watson had a horrible season, and hasn’t played well in 3 seasons, yet comes in as a Tier 2 guy. Cousins and Murray ahead of Purdy?? Please. Rogers is a Tier 1? Based 3 years ago? He sucked shit through a tube last year.

I added Tier 5 as the Athletic left the last two guys off.

Tier 1

A Tier 1 quarterback can carry his team each week. The team wins because of him. He expertly handles pure passing situations. He has no real holes in his game.

1 Patrick Mahomes Chiefs
2 Joe Burrow Bengals
3 Josh Allen Bills
4 Aaron Rodgers Jets
5 Justin Herbert Chargers

Tier 2

A Tier 2 quarterback can carry his team sometimes but not as consistently. He can handle pure passing situations in doses and/or possesses other dimensions that are special enough to elevate him above Tier 3. He has a hole or two in his game.

6 Jalen Hurts Eagles
7 Lamar Jackson Ravens
8 Trevor Lawrence Jaguars
9 Dak Prescott Cowboys
10 Matthew Stafford Rams
11 Deshaun Watson Browns
12 Kirk Cousins Vikings

Tier 3

A Tier 3 quarterback is a legitimate starter but needs a heavier running game and/or defensive component to win. A lower-volume dropback passing offense suits him best.

13 Kyler Murray Cardinals
14 Derek Carr Saints
15 Jared Goff Lions
16 Russell Wilson Broncos
17 Tua Tagovailoa Dolphins
18 Jimmy Garoppolo Raiders
19 Daniel Jones Giants
20 Geno Smith Seahawks
21 Justin Fields Bears
22 Ryan Tannehill Titans
23 Mac Jones Patriots

Tier 4

A Tier 4 quarterback could be an unproven player (not enough information for voters to classify) or a veteran who ideally would not start all 17 games.

24 Brock Purdy 49ers
25 Kenny Pickett Steelers
26 Jordan Love Packers
27 Baker Mayfield Buccaneers
28 Sam Howell Commanders
29 Desmond Ridder Falcons 
30 Gardner Minshew Colts

Tier 5

A Tier 5 quarterback that sucks balls all day and twice on Sunday. Or a rookie.

31 CJ Stroud Texans
32 Bryce Young Panthers

Just got word from Coach Shanahan that Brock Purdy has been cleared to practice with the team as camp opens on Thursday. Purdy is “cleared without restriction” per Shanny. This is excellent news.

But let’s hope he can stay healthy. We have an unnerving ability to get our quarterbacks hurt, but let’s focus on the good. Purdy is the #1 at this point and time, and I don’t see anything changing, and the roster is pretty much set in stone at this point. The big fight appears to be who is the #2 quarterback, and did we waste another 3rd round pick on a RB who is soon to be cut for a UDFA. As in Klahan Laborn beating out Ty Davis-Price. A la Jordan Mason beating out Trey Sermon. The list of successful UDFA RBs goes back to Shanny’s 1st season here, so I’m glad we used the usual wasted 3rd round RB spot for a kicker.

Sam linebacker is about the only starting spot up for grabs. Oren Burkes looks to beat out the long-winded Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles and become the starting strong side linebacker after his strong showing last year when the Al-Shaair went down.

Amazingly, despite 25 free agents, the 49ers only lost a few starters, returning 19 of 22 of them. The most obvious being Mike McGlinchey. They also lost Samuel Ebukam and Azeez Al-Shaair. Ebukam has been replaced by Mike Hargraves, and that spot looks upgraded. And the previously mentioned Sam LB spot is up for grabs between DFF, Burkes, and late draft picks Dee Winters and Jalen Graham.

I’m still worried about our offensive line depth. Or lack thereof. Jaylon Moore, a 5th round pick from a couple years ago, likely won’t make the team. And that is bad news considering he couldn’t beat out Matt Pryor, a less than average guy we picked up off the slag heap. Nik Zakelj looks to be on the firing line very quickly if (when) Trent Williams gets dinged up, or Colton McKivitz kivitzes his way out of the starting spot. Hopefully we can get someone better after cuts start happening. The 49ers have a knack for turning shit to gold with their linemen (and running backs), but I think we NEED more depth.

Well, not really. There’s a book out there called The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell. Written by a high school friend of mine, Bob Dugoni. But I digress. And I should read it. Sounds good.

Darnold? My only take on him is, if it comes to the point where Darnold passes Lance on the depth chart, then Lance is basically a throw-away. He has been in the system more than long enough to grasp its intricacies and know how to run the team. Sure, it was disconcerting when Purdy came in and ran it to perfection, but was that Jimmy G’s offense? Surely Shanahan isn’t going to run the same offense for both guys is he? Should he?

What exactly was Shanahan trying to do with Lance for those 5.25 quarters? Break him? Sure, the Chicago game was pretty much a washout, but the Seattle game saw Lance running read-option plays. Plays that Shanahan said he wouldn’t use. He said the season before that he would not use Lance like Lamar Jackson, but he went out and did it anyway. And it got Lance hurt. THREE read-option runs up the gut in the first fucking quarter is pretty stupid no matter how you slice it.

Of course Jimmy G comes in and saves the day! Posting a nice victory over the hated Seahawks that fateful day. Then again, GQ shit the bed against our once and future nemesis, Russell Wilson and the worst goddamn team in the NFL, the Denver Phillies. But fuck that. I digress again.

My conundrum here is the quarterback situation. Lance SHOULD be running the same system as Purdy and Jimmy G, and presumably Sam Fucking Darnold. He of the high draft spot and failed expectations. His numbers are shit, and as he’s gone through the Jets (abysmal) and the Panthers (fair-to-middling), but really, he hasn’t really gotten any better. In his words he was looking for a stable organization to learn from the coaches and players, yadda yadda yadda, and I get that both the Jets (especially the 2018-2019 versions) and the Panthers were absolute shitshows, but he hasn’t shown squat so far. But can Kyle the quarterback whisperer do something with Darnold? I don’t even want to find out.

This team has gone through more quarterbacks than shit goes through a goose. They even changed the rules around suiting up QBs. Now allowing 3 per game without the penalty of whatever the idiotic reasoning is for allowing only 48 guys to suit up on game day as part of the 53 man roster. You’d think with all the attrition in ANY given game, they’d allow all 53 to be active. Fucking dumb.

But we haven’t really done anything to beef up the line. In fact it got worse with Brunskill leaving. I sure hope McGlinchey is bested by McKivitz’s game, because we haven’t added any depth, We are hoping against hope that our past low-level picks step up.

*gulp*

Since there’s nothing to talk about until the rookies report in a week, there are a couple truly bizarre stories floating around on the interweb tubes. Sam Darnold is staying with George Kittle while he figures out his accommodations, and is living in Kittle’s pool house. A pool house that is apparently haunted.

Darnold went on to say ‘it’s creepy’ and said he felt like there was a ‘presence’ in the room with him late at night.

According to Darnold, Kittle’s property is “haunted,” he said recently adding that he’s never been a part of something like that before.

“It was crazy, though. I’ve never had anything like that happen before. And I’m talking about both the New England game and at George’s house. But it was crazy man. Like, I woke up, and you know how sometimes you have a dream and then you wake up and you feel like you can’t move for like maybe four or five seconds, whatever it is?”

Darnold said he felt some type of presence in the room that distracted him as he went to sleep and caused untold issues during the late hours of the night.

“And you know, I felt that, and I woke up, it was like 3 a.m., went to go take a pee and, you know, came back, fell right asleep,” he reportedly said. “And then, that next night, the same thing happened, and I couldn’t, like, I had to keep focusing on this thing…there was something else in the room.”

To top that, Deebo Samuel abruptly ended a phone interview with Zach Gelb, who also had Aaron Donald hang up on him last year. It seemed fairly innocuous as Gelb was pretty much on board with the fact that the 49ers would have won had Purdy not gotten hurt. Deebo didn’t seem to like this and when Gelb kept talking about the Eagles game, he bailed. Better than a contract dispute, but hey. there’s nothing else going on.

Truly the doldrums where it comes to football news. I guess the big excitement is Brock Purdy got engaged. Woo hoo. Hope the kid has a bright future as the latest stud 49er quarterback, but this team seems to have very persistent problems keeping their quarterback upright. That the 49ers were SO successful with their 3rd string, 262nd, and last pick in the draft, is pretty fucking amazing. Trey Lance of course had one game in a hurricane, and one quarter where he was used like Ken Willard, Jimmy G was fine until he wasn’t, and Brock took the league by storm till he got hurt.

Which brings me to the issue of beefing up the O line. For all intents and purposes, they did little but get weaker at right tackle as the 49ers didn’t want to pay Mike McGlinchey for his fair to middling pass blocking, and instead left that to Colton McKivitz. And they let Daniel Brunskill go in free agency.

McKivitz is promising as a pass blocker, and his only start was against the fairly fierce LA Rams. He graded out at a solid 69.4 grade in his 71 plays last season, and 84.6 in the LA start. But, after Trent Williams and KcKivitz, we have bupkis. Backups Jaylon Moore and Matt Pryor have not shown anything resembling consistent pay.

After that we have UDFA D-II standout guy Joey Fisher, who couldn’t make it through rookie mini-camp and seemed bothered by the 75 degree heat, so he doesn’t look to stick. Nick Zakelj looks to be moved to center to find a spot on the roster, Leroy Watson is a waiver-wire pickup from last year, Ilm Manning is a smaller small-school (Hawaii) standout UDFA who seems to fit the long-standing idea of drafting smaller quicker guys on the line. He however, is also pencilled in for a move to center.

Feliciano, Gutierrez, and Luciano are all varying flavors of who knows. My hope is we can grab some kind of overpriced vet during the cut-downs, but maybe the front office has a better sense of what these guys can do. I mean, I hope so, but the depth is a big worry seeing how old Williams is, and how green/untested Mckivitz is.

The national media, having deemed Trey Lance as the 3rd string wasted pick benchwarmer turd cast-off, and the quarterback position being the weak link on the team, has started the dialogue that we are no longer Super Bowl contenders and that we will fall short of the goal this season.

Since the national media has no idea what is really going on, and doesn’t seem to understand that this offense is fairly quarterback-friendly, hey, go ahead and bury us. Purdy made his bones running the opposing team offense last season, stepped in and caught on very quickly in real games. He’s on track to being ready for week 1.

What this means to the national scribes of course is that Purdy is living in a cave 2 miles underground and has no contact with the outside world, let alone the team, and that he is hopelessly behind in his understanding of the 49ers offense. So, since Lance is dwelling somewhere near Colin Kaepernick bust territory, Sudden Sam Darnold is the guy that has to save the season. And he will fail.

This is of course based on nothing. But, the gist of it is, whenever the scribes deem us worthy, we fall short. Now that they have jumped off the bandwagon, shit will go right.

Of note:

. . . for reals. He is winging his way to Jacksonville (gulp) with his QB coach Will Hewlett and his ortho guy. He is on schedule for week 1 of the regular season.

I guess this is great news. But, as I’ve said a few times before, I’d love to see Lance take at least the first 2 games. This way we can see:

a) What Lance has to offer
b) How the offensive line is doing
c) Give Purdy more time to heal up and get ready for the long haul that is the regular season (and playoffs)

Truth be told, I can’t remember the last time a quarterback lasted a whole season for the 49ers. I guess it was 2019, but it feels like 20 years ago. The name of the game of course is attrition. Stay relatively healthy and the 49ers should be fine.

Given the QB situation, we still should be the favorites for the 1st round bye. Last year, even with the shit start, upheaval at quarterback, and all the injuries, the 49ers were one game from being the #1 seed. Any kind of stability and we should be the front-runners.

Anyhow, here’s an article on Purdy and his throwing regimen.

https://www.nfl.com/news/49ers-qb-brock-purdy-heading-to-jacksonville-to-throw-as-he-continues-elbow-reha

Well, the pendulum has swung back to how shitty Trey Lance is. This of course was the premise 2 months ago. What happened between now and then? Nothing. No real practices, no camps, no preseason games. But the ‘wow, Lance worked out with Mahomes and looked great’ as spun back 180 and the turd has turned.

Just the usual clickbait bullshit. Adam Schefter says that Lance will be the 3rd string coach. Based on, well, nothing. He’s shocked there’s no trade value for a guy who hasn’t played much due to injuries. And why would the Niners trade him when they went through 3 QBs in ONE GAME last year? Yeah, it was the NFCCG, but we had lost Trey Lance AND Jimmy G before that game even happened. Of course the New York Post has to run with the most salacious of them all and proclaim:

https://nypost.com/2023/06/22/trey-lance-not-even-a-backup-with-49ers/

So here we are again, spinning in the toilet.