The Trey Lance thread

[Big J]

Again, absolutely no one is saying Purdy is a pro bowl, much less a HOF, QB. You are emphatically saying he cannot win it all because of his limited physical abilities, and that he cannot be a top QB. We are simply pointing out that there are some guys - admittedly a very small number - who were able to attain the heights despite similar limitations. And that Purdy's processing, decisiveness, anticipation, and accuracy are arguably physical skills (and skills period, whether we differentiate mental and physical) that you are underrating, especially in this system.

Purdy may be Kirk Cousins. And you know, if we could get Kirk Cousins for under $1 million a year, I would be fine with that move. I think this team would be the SB favorite in that case. Cousins' problem - and possibly Purdy's in a couple years - is that it's hard to win when you're paying him almost as much as the elite guys at the position. I absolutely agree that you cannot win it all with that arrangement.

But lets at least see what Purdy does with those two years before we write him off.

While we continue to look at later-round QBs with some upside.

This take seems completely rational. My main issue is that the whole reason we drafted Lance was to get a QB who had elite potential in order to put the team over the top, so then why are we settling on a guy who tops out as Kirk **** Cousins?

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

[Big J]

Well, sure, if you want. But what data there is is all outlier, it was kindof a big story at the time.

I guess. It just seemed like he got way too much credit for throwing 5 yard swing passes to the playmakers and being propped up by a top defense. If it had been Jimmy G on that win streak everyone would have been attributing those wins to the McCaffey trade.

You keep repeating this fiction as fact. The stats don't lie.

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

[Harry Palmer]

This take seems completely rational. My main issue is that the whole reason we drafted Lance was to get a QB who had elite potential in order to put the team over the top, so then why are we settling on a guy who tops out as Kirk **** Cousins?

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

More wiggle room than he got? Yes. Enough to beat out Brock? No, as explained it was Brock’s to lose and unlike the Darnold/QB2 thing the Niners were pretty explicit about that and pretty much everyone understood. You play as well as Brock did, you go out on an injury in and NFC Championship game that I think we can all agree doesn’t happen if he doesn’t play as well as he did with zero prep, and the job is yours to lose. That’s what the phrase means, you have to lose it. And as for the practice picks, honestly that much I’m willing to defer to the coaches and the injury recovery. And yeah, I say the latter about Lance too. And who knows if Brock is just testing his limitations, something we’d have liked to see more of from Trey. But w/e the games got real Brock played very well, and he’d have to do something dramatically worse or Trey (or I suppose academically Sam) dramatically better to supplant him. Now if Trey’s on the team and we seriously underachieve and Brock’s looking much more irrelevant say 10 games in, am I pushing for Trey to get a shot? Probably. That’s partly why I’m so pissed they dealt him, our entire upside now rests on how much better Brock can play than last year and I suspect that’s not too much. But if he plays like last year or how he’s looked so far in preseason games we don’t need upside, we’re pretty much there.

[Big J]

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

More wiggle room than he got? Yes. Enough to beat out Brock? No, as explained it was Brock’s to lose and unlike the Darnold/QB2 thing the Niners were pretty explicit about that and pretty much everyone understood. You play as well as Brock did, you go out on an injury in and NFC Championship game that I think we can all agree doesn’t happen if he doesn’t play as well as he did with zero prep, and the job is yours to lose. That’s what the phrase means, you have to lose it. And as for the practice picks, honestly that much I’m willing to defer to the coaches and the injury recovery. And yeah, I say the latter about Lance too. And who knows if Brock is just testing his limitations, something we’d have liked to see more of from Trey. But w/e the games got real Brock played very well, and he’d have to do something dramatically worse or Trey (or I suppose academically Sam) dramatically better to supplant him. Now if Trey’s on the team and we seriously underachieve and Brock’s looking much more irrelevant say 10 games in, am I pushing for Trey to get a shot? Probably. That’s partly why I’m so pissed they dealt him, our entire upside now rests on how much better Brock can play than last year and I suspect that’s not too much. But if he plays like last year or how he’s looked so far in preseason games we don’t need upside, we’re pretty much there.

At the very least the team could have used Trey in a super charged Taysom Hill role. Throw him out there on goal line packages and the defense has to deal with the threat of a 250 lb qb ramming it in on them. Just makes absolutely zero sense to trade him for peanuts.

[Harry Palmer]

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

More wiggle room than he got? Yes. Enough to beat out Brock? No, as explained it was Brock’s to lose and unlike the Darnold/QB2 thing the Niners were pretty explicit about that and pretty much everyone understood. You play as well as Brock did, you go out on an injury in and NFC Championship game that I think we can all agree doesn’t happen if he doesn’t play as well as he did with zero prep, and the job is yours to lose. That’s what the phrase means, you have to lose it. And as for the practice picks, honestly that much I’m willing to defer to the coaches and the injury recovery. And yeah, I say the latter about Lance too. And who knows if Brock is just testing his limitations, something we’d have liked to see more of from Trey. But w/e the games got real Brock played very well, and he’d have to do something dramatically worse or Trey (or I suppose academically Sam) dramatically better to supplant him. Now if Trey’s on the team and we seriously underachieve and Brock’s looking much more irrelevant say 10 games in, am I pushing for Trey to get a shot? Probably. That’s partly why I’m so pissed they dealt him, our entire upside now rests on how much better Brock can play than last year and I suspect that’s not too much. But if he plays like last year or how he’s looked so far in preseason games we don’t need upside, we’re pretty much there.

At the very least the team could have used Trey in a super charged Taysom Hill role. Throw him out there on goal line packages and the defense has to deal with the threat of a 250 lb qb ramming it in on them. Just makes absolutely zero sense to trade him for peanuts.

Here we are in perfect agreement. I think the odds are Trey doesn’t become a star, but that’s just the odds on star quarterbacks. And I’ll go one step further…a maxed out Trey I’m more comfortable giving star QB money than a maxed out Brock. Part of what makes Brock such a find is his ~ lesser star quality play at negligible salary for several years. But there’s a decent chance he becomes our Kirk Cousins dilemma a few years down the line, and that’s another reason I’m pissed Trey’s gone, I don’t know that we get too many more shots at that kind of package if we’re winning as much as I think we’ll be. But that’s also why Brock had to be the guy until something dramatic happens, because we can expect to be winning a lot in the next couple of years. And the team knows that too.

[CrimsonCrew]

I guess. It just seemed like he got way too much credit for throwing 5 yard swing passes to the playmakers and being propped up by a top defense. If it had been Jimmy G on that win streak everyone would have been attributing those wins to the McCaffey trade.

You keep repeating this fiction as fact. The stats don't lie.

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

Re-watch the Seahawks game. He may not be throwing 50 yards downfield, but he threw multiple strikes 20+ yards downfield and just tore them up in the second half. Plenty of short passes, too, but he was certainly throwing downfield. Not to mention his best play of the day was an incompletion in the endzone.

[Big J]

More wiggle room than he got? Yes. Enough to beat out Brock? No, as explained it was Brock’s to lose and unlike the Darnold/QB2 thing the Niners were pretty explicit about that and pretty much everyone understood. You play as well as Brock did, you go out on an injury in and NFC Championship game that I think we can all agree doesn’t happen if he doesn’t play as well as he did with zero prep, and the job is yours to lose. That’s what the phrase means, you have to lose it. And as for the practice picks, honestly that much I’m willing to defer to the coaches and the injury recovery. And yeah, I say the latter about Lance too. And who knows if Brock is just testing his limitations, something we’d have liked to see more of from Trey. But w/e the games got real Brock played very well, and he’d have to do something dramatically worse or Trey (or I suppose academically Sam) dramatically better to supplant him. Now if Trey’s on the team and we seriously underachieve and Brock’s looking much more irrelevant say 10 games in, am I pushing for Trey to get a shot? Probably. That’s partly why I’m so pissed they dealt him, our entire upside now rests on how much better Brock can play than last year and I suspect that’s not too much. But if he plays like last year or how he’s looked so far in preseason games we don’t need upside, we’re pretty much there.

At the very least the team could have used Trey in a super charged Taysom Hill role. Throw him out there on goal line packages and the defense has to deal with the threat of a 250 lb qb ramming it in on them. Just makes absolutely zero sense to trade him for peanuts.

Here we are in perfect agreement. I think the odds are Trey doesn’t become a star, but that’s just the odds on star quarterbacks. And I’ll go one step further…a maxed out Trey I’m more comfortable giving star QB money than a maxed out Brock. Part of what makes Brock such a find is his ~ lesser star quality play at negligible salary for several years. But there’s a decent chance he becomes our Kirk Cousins dilemma a few years down the line, and that’s another reason I’m pissed Trey’s gone, I don’t know that we get too many more shots at that kind of package if we’re winning as much as I think we’ll be. But that’s also why Brock had to be the guy until something dramatic happens, because we can expect to be winning a lot in the next couple of years. And the team knows that too.

The odds of Trey becoming a star aren’t any higher or lower than they were when he was drafted. We don’t know what he will become because he only played 5 quarters for the team.

[Harry Palmer]

At the very least the team could have used Trey in a super charged Taysom Hill role. Throw him out there on goal line packages and the defense has to deal with the threat of a 250 lb qb ramming it in on them. Just makes absolutely zero sense to trade him for peanuts.

Here we are in perfect agreement. I think the odds are Trey doesn’t become a star, but that’s just the odds on star quarterbacks. And I’ll go one step further…a maxed out Trey I’m more comfortable giving star QB money than a maxed out Brock. Part of what makes Brock such a find is his ~ lesser star quality play at negligible salary for several years. But there’s a decent chance he becomes our Kirk Cousins dilemma a few years down the line, and that’s another reason I’m pissed Trey’s gone, I don’t know that we get too many more shots at that kind of package if we’re winning as much as I think we’ll be. But that’s also why Brock had to be the guy until something dramatic happens, because we can expect to be winning a lot in the next couple of years. And the team knows that too.

The odds of Trey becoming a star aren’t any higher or lower than they were when he was drafted. We don’t know what he will become because he only played 5 quarters for the team.

They’re slightly lowered because that much time had passed, so his prime has been cut which lowers the odds, and this is completely my subjective opinion, but they’re lowered a little bit more because now he has good cause to have a confidence issue without a lot of game time to use as a foundation to push against negative opinions. But other than those two caveats and most importantly in any way that isn’t partly/mainly? the organization’s fault I wholly agree.

[Pattersonca65]

This take seems completely rational. My main issue is that the whole reason we drafted Lance was to get a QB who had elite potential in order to put the team over the top, so then why are we settling on a guy who tops out as Kirk **** Cousins?

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

Because it is practice. There is a reason for it. Even elite QBs throw picks in practice

[CrimsonCrew]

Here we are in perfect agreement. I think the odds are Trey doesn’t become a star, but that’s just the odds on star quarterbacks. And I’ll go one step further…a maxed out Trey I’m more comfortable giving star QB money than a maxed out Brock. Part of what makes Brock such a find is his ~ lesser star quality play at negligible salary for several years. But there’s a decent chance he becomes our Kirk Cousins dilemma a few years down the line, and that’s another reason I’m pissed Trey’s gone, I don’t know that we get too many more shots at that kind of package if we’re winning as much as I think we’ll be. But that’s also why Brock had to be the guy until something dramatic happens, because we can expect to be winning a lot in the next couple of years. And the team knows that too.

The odds of Trey becoming a star aren’t any higher or lower than they were when he was drafted. We don’t know what he will become because he only played 5 quarters for the team.

They’re slightly lowered because that much time had passed, so his prime has been cut which lowers the odds, and this is completely my subjective opinion, but they’re lowered a little bit more because now he has good cause to have a confidence issue without a lot of game time to use as a foundation to push against negative opinions. But other than those two caveats and most importantly in any way that isn’t partly/mainly? the organization’s fault I wholly agree.

Yeah, fair or unfair, the odds are lower now. At this point, he's going to be battling for a #2 spot. I can't see him challenging for a starting job any time soon, which means he's going to have to fight for snaps. He's definitely in a worse situation now than he was coming out, but that doesn't mean he can't still succeed. I sure hope it's not for the Cowboys, but I'd like to see the kid put together a career. Everything I've seen or heard raves about him as a person. He's taken some real lumps, and hopefully that's not the end of his story.

[Pattersonca65]

I guess. It just seemed like he got way too much credit for throwing 5 yard swing passes to the playmakers and being propped up by a top defense. If it had been Jimmy G on that win streak everyone would have been attributing those wins to the McCaffey trade.

You keep repeating this fiction as fact. The stats don't lie.

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

Just because you keep repeating the same lie over and over again doesn't make it true. If you look at his passing stats from 2022, your narrative falls apart

[CrimsonCrew]

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

Because it is practice. There is a reason for it. Even elite QBs throw picks in practice

Yeah, in all likelihood there was nothing Purdy could do in practice - other than have the arm fail - that was going to make the FO change their minds on him. He had shown it in the regular season and the playoffs. Now, again, maybe if Lance looked incredible and Purdy was throwing all these interceptions, you would have had some discussion. But Lance was very far from that.

Let's not forget that Lance threw two bad INTs in actual preseason games, and had at least three or four more balls go right off defenders' hands (not including the two-point attempt). And that was in less than a full game worth of playing time. You can't bounce back from that to challenge for the starting job.

[Harry Palmer]

The odds of Trey becoming a star aren’t any higher or lower than they were when he was drafted. We don’t know what he will become because he only played 5 quarters for the team.

They’re slightly lowered because that much time had passed, so his prime has been cut which lowers the odds, and this is completely my subjective opinion, but they’re lowered a little bit more because now he has good cause to have a confidence issue without a lot of game time to use as a foundation to push against negative opinions. But other than those two caveats and most importantly in any way that isn’t partly/mainly? the organization’s fault I wholly agree.

Yeah, fair or unfair, the odds are lower now. At this point, he's going to be battling for a #2 spot. I can't see him challenging for a starting job any time soon, which means he's going to have to fight for snaps. He's definitely in a worse situation now than he was coming out, but that doesn't mean he can't still succeed. I sure hope it's not for the Cowboys, but I'd like to see the kid put together a career. Everything I've seen or heard raves about him as a person. He's taken some real lumps, and hopefully that's not the end of his story.

Another point is that as inexplicably insufficient as they may have been in showing it, Trey had people in the Niners org who had pounded the table for him, attached some of their credibility to his succeeding, and invested a lot of capital in acquiring him. In Dallas they have an owner who invested a late 4th round pick in him. That’s a very different situation to be in, they would be much less troubled by Trey’s failing and just cutting bait and moving on than the Niners were as an organization.

[wco81]

I guess. It just seemed like he got way too much credit for throwing 5 yard swing passes to the playmakers and being propped up by a top defense. If it had been Jimmy G on that win streak everyone would have been attributing those wins to the McCaffey trade.

You keep repeating this fiction as fact. The stats don't lie.

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

That’s great actually, if the 49ers keep getting big RAC plays off low risk throws.

That means great blocking downfield by agile OL and WRs blocking for each other.

Teams have to sit on screens and short passes, force 49ers to beat them over the top.

Last year they didn’t have to.

[Big J]

Because of how well he played, and how the moment was pretty damb big but not too big for him. I think it’s that simple. I hate that we went Darnold over Trey, but Trey didn’t do anything to supplant Brock, and Brock also risked a career-altering surgical option to try and get back earlier, which I was really uncomfortable with the way the organization was pressuring him to do, but he did it and it seems to have worked and you have to give him credit for that as an organization.

If they had gone with Lance over Trey based on what we saw you seriously risk losing the locker room, even the Trey fans in it. Now the question imo is did they really give Trey an opportunity to beat out Darnold? No, I don’t think they did. I think Trey was QB1 if Brock is still recovering or his arm didn’t come back, QB3 unless Darnold falls on his face and the question really became was it worth keeping Trey as the Plan B/C when they really don’t want to be in that situation, like that old Gruden quote. I think the odds are he would have played if he stayed here, but that’s a reflection of how often Niners get hurt and I don’t think Kyle likes to think that’s a thing. So from that perspective you’re keeping Trey to not develop him some more, I can see the futility of that situation from that POV even before you get to the obvious fact that the team was tired of the subject.

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

Because it is practice. There is a reason for it. Even elite QBs throw picks in practice

Then why was Trey so scrutinized about what he did in practice if Purdy wasn’t? Seems like a double standard.

[Big J]

You keep repeating this fiction as fact. The stats don't lie.

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

That’s great actually, if the 49ers keep getting big RAC plays off low risk throws.

That means great blocking downfield by agile OL and WRs blocking for each other.

Teams have to sit on screens and short passes, force 49ers to beat them over the top.

Last year they didn’t have to.

Yea, but what is going to happen when defenses adjust this year and sit on the short stuff? Purdy will be forced to throw deep, and under throw every ball because he has a weak arm.

[Harry Palmer]

He was throwing short passes to the best group of playmakers in the league. There is no lie there.

That’s great actually, if the 49ers keep getting big RAC plays off low risk throws.

That means great blocking downfield by agile OL and WRs blocking for each other.

Teams have to sit on screens and short passes, force 49ers to beat them over the top.

Last year they didn’t have to.

Yea, but what is going to happen when defenses adjust this year and sit on the short stuff? Purdy will be forced to throw deep, and under throw every ball because he has a weak arm.

They weren’t really playing too scared of the deep ball last year, and also he was pretty sharp on longer intermediate passes, which given how much the Niners stretch horizontally does make for a ton of room to cover. I mean he goes deeper more often than Jimmy, and has a much greater ability to move the pocket and/or improvise and the league had lots of info on Handsome Jimmy and he still played the best of his career after they got CMC into the offence. A cheaper, more mobile, more creative, more willing to attack further downfield Jimmy in this offence is pretty damn effective.

[Big J]

That’s great actually, if the 49ers keep getting big RAC plays off low risk throws.

That means great blocking downfield by agile OL and WRs blocking for each other.

Teams have to sit on screens and short passes, force 49ers to beat them over the top.

Last year they didn’t have to.

Yea, but what is going to happen when defenses adjust this year and sit on the short stuff? Purdy will be forced to throw deep, and under throw every ball because he has a weak arm.

They weren’t really playing too scared of the deep ball last year, and also he was pretty sharp on longer intermediate passes, which given how much the Niners stretch horizontally does make for a ton of room to cover. I mean he goes deeper more often than Jimmy, and has a much greater ability to move the pocket and/or improvise and the league had lots of info on Handsome Jimmy and he still played the best of his career after they got CMC into the offence. A cheaper, more mobile, more creative, more willing to attack further downfield Jimmy in this offence is pretty damn effective.

I dunno man. Jimmy had years of experience, and he got really good at reading defenses and taking what they would give him. Kind of reach to say that Purdy is already better than Jimmy was at his peak when we haven't even seen defenses adjust to him.

[Harry Palmer]

Yea, but what is going to happen when defenses adjust this year and sit on the short stuff? Purdy will be forced to throw deep, and under throw every ball because he has a weak arm.

They weren’t really playing too scared of the deep ball last year, and also he was pretty sharp on longer intermediate passes, which given how much the Niners stretch horizontally does make for a ton of room to cover. I mean he goes deeper more often than Jimmy, and has a much greater ability to move the pocket and/or improvise and the league had lots of info on Handsome Jimmy and he still played the best of his career after they got CMC into the offence. A cheaper, more mobile, more creative, more willing to attack further downfield Jimmy in this offence is pretty damn effective.

I dunno man. Jimmy had years of experience, and he got really good at reading defenses and taking what they would give him. Kind of reach to say that Purdy is already better than Jimmy was at his peak when we haven't even seen defenses adjust to him.

I mean, fair enough I guess. What Jimmy was good at (quick release, over the middle short to intermediate ~ slants and branches off that tree throws, creating openings with his eyes and footwork when it comes to quick re-sets) he was pretty damn elite at, and I think we started to take a lot of that for granted over time. Jimmy’s ability to subtly move defenders just enough and deliver quick darts over the middle to the point where he consistently created lanes despite throwing into an area the defence knew he was going to throw into in some ways shouldn’t be doable at this level, that’s imo where he was least appreciated. So yeah, he had strengths I probably shouldn’t take for granted either.

And to a degree Shanahan’s offence does rely heavily on some of those. But what Jimmy wasn’t good at, it was a limitation (moving the pocket, moving generally aside from those quick hip flips I mentioned, looking second level or more, the semi-regular inexplicable blind spots in his reads, and especially the inability to create off script to the point where once the play was extended beyond quick reads you were just praying he’d ground the ball) and on many of these Brock was already quite obviously ahead of Jimmy’s ~ limitations last year. And you saw it with how Shanahan called the games, he quickly got more aggressive, quickly started reincorporating moving the pocket…a staple of his offence when Jimmy’s not playing historically, and showed trust where Brock went off script. Those were pretty evident just watching, and while he’s never going to challenge for quickest draw in the west like Jimmy could, he was still good to very good at the things Jimmy excelled at, particularly creating openings with his eyes and a lot of the same crossing patterns.

That said I think the most obvious thing you got watching was the degree you which Brock seemed to ~ see the game the way Shanahan does while at the same time being able to create if the design didn’t work perfectly. And I will admit that while I know Kyle says nice things about this aspect I wonder how much of that was gritting his teeth and bearing it, because he has a pretty unusual degree of expecting his qb to rely on the system and more or less just throw the ball away if it breaks down. And therefore how much will he over time kinda iron that out of Brock’s game, but I also think Brock’s ~ humble cockiness is one of his greater strengths and I think the team especially appreciated him when he sort of stood up to teacher that way, so maybe the combination is kind of a perfect match that way. Jimmy had some of the same self-confidence and the team loved that too, but his confidence turned into recklessness when plays broke down whereas Brock could actually deliver in those situations. But we’ll see, maybe some of last year was Kyle literally having no alternative and maybe now with his Darnold crush nearby he feels more able to lean on Brock to paint by the numbers.

But yes, the ~ main asset that flipped the field for both was having CMC as a big-play safety valve, it really does make the offence a little bit idiot-proof and hard to contain on a lot of plays. Now maybe that too is a concern as teams get more film, maybe CMC gets scouted down, but I think there he also knows the offence better and we’ve also got one of the best play designers in history having had more time to figure out ways to utilize his strengths so I’m hoping that at least cancels out.

[Pattersonca65]

Okay, but shouldn’t Trey have been given more room for error due to the fact that he has the highest upside? Hell Purdy was throwing picks left in right during training camp according to Grant Cohn, and never had any consequences for it, but yet they killed Trey for any little error he made. It’s not surprising that he & Jimmy are coming out and roasting the coaching staff here for how they were treated.

More wiggle room than he got? Yes. Enough to beat out Brock? No, as explained it was Brock’s to lose and unlike the Darnold/QB2 thing the Niners were pretty explicit about that and pretty much everyone understood. You play as well as Brock did, you go out on an injury in and NFC Championship game that I think we can all agree doesn’t happen if he doesn’t play as well as he did with zero prep, and the job is yours to lose. That’s what the phrase means, you have to lose it. And as for the practice picks, honestly that much I’m willing to defer to the coaches and the injury recovery. And yeah, I say the latter about Lance too. And who knows if Brock is just testing his limitations, something we’d have liked to see more of from Trey. But w/e the games got real Brock played very well, and he’d have to do something dramatically worse or Trey (or I suppose academically Sam) dramatically better to supplant him. Now if Trey’s on the team and we seriously underachieve and Brock’s looking much more irrelevant say 10 games in, am I pushing for Trey to get a shot? Probably. That’s partly why I’m so pissed they dealt him, our entire upside now rests on how much better Brock can play than last year and I suspect that’s not too much. But if he plays like last year or how he’s looked so far in preseason games we don’t need upside, we’re pretty much there.

At the very least the team could have used Trey in a super charged Taysom Hill role. Throw him out there on goal line packages and the defense has to deal with the threat of a 250 lb qb ramming it in on them. Just makes absolutely zero sense to trade him for peanuts.

Trey Lance got hurt running early in the season. And they are going to continue trying to run him into people? And there is reason most teams that have tried what you are advocating abandoned it.