49ers general manager John Lynch joins Tolbert & Lund at 5 pm. Listen live on KNBR 680.
C.J. Beathard’s performance against the 1-9 New York Giants seems to have made quite an impression on 49ers general manager John Lynch.
The rookie third-round pick had the best game of his young career on Sunday, completing 19-of-25 passes for 288 yards and two touchdowns, while posting a QB rating of 123.4, and leading the 49ers to their first win of the season. It all happened with the team’s presumed quarterback of the future, Jimmy Garoppolo, riding the pine for the second consecutive game.
With the 49ers on a bye week and their next game not until November 26 vs. the Seahawks, many assumed this would be the most likely time for Garoppolo to make his debut, as he will have been with the team for a month by that point, and should have enough of a grasp of Shanahan’s system to see some action.
It would appear that’s not going to be the case, however, as Lynch strongly implied that Beathard will continue to be the team’s QB of the immediate future, in a conversation with 49ers beat writer Matt Maiocco that will air on NBC Saturday.
“The plan is to continue to get him ready,” Lynch said of Garoppolo. “It’s a very different system he played under. A great system, but a different system he played under in New England. And (head coach Kyle Shanahan’s) system is complex for a quarterback. There’s a lot of verbiage in every play call. There are a lot of adjustments on every play call that the quarterback controls.
“We want to set Jimmy up for success and also the way (C.J. Beathard’s) playing is helping us sit back. And now we have a bye week. They’re going to work hard during this week to get him up to speed. But right now, we don’t need him. C.J. just played a great game and his teammates really believe in him. We think it’s nothing but a good situation.”
Complicating things is the fact that Garoppolo’s contract only lasts through this season, meaning that if he doesn’t receive meaningful playing time, the 49ers will have to make a decision on his future without knowing exactly what they have. Lynch doesn’t seem to be worried about that, and is confident that Garoppolo has the ability to be a franchise quarterback.
“We know what we like about Garoppolo,” Lynch said. “And that’s only been strengthened by the time that’s he’s been here. We’re just going to let these things play out. That’s in Kyle’s hands.
“People have had all these ideas about why we got Jimmy. We got Jimmy because we think he has big-time ability at the quarterback position. And we believe so much—to get where we need to get—you have to have a franchise quarterback. We think he’s got that ability. Whether that happens, when that happens, we’ll see. But we certainly like his future with the 49ers.”