San Francisco 49ers: 5 Reasons Jimmy Garoppolo trade is brilliant
2. Development of young offensive players
Speaking of the offense, the issues with playing Hoyer and Beathard this year haven’t just affected the architect and institutor, Shanahan. They’ve also affected the players on the 49ers roster catching passes or getting hand-offs from those quarterbacks. While there are some veteran players that understand the struggle and can weather through this, there are also a litany of young pieces on the unit.
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When people talk about player development, a lot of that is measured in purely the number of snaps they play. Reps help in any capacity. However, not equating snaps and quality snaps played would be a wise practice. And when Hoyer or Beathard is your quarterback, there aren’t any player on that San Francisco offense seeing many quality snaps.
As a result, guys like tight end George Kittle, wide receiver Trent Taylor and even running back Matt Breida aren’t getting the looks they need to develop — or rather, they haven’t been. With the addition of Garoppolo, however, that changes. Even if Jimmy G doesn’t pan out to be a superstar, there’s no chance he’s lesser of a player than the two starters the Niners have had to this point in the season. Thus, the development of those guys and others is exponentially increased.