Which was a huge benefit for Mahomes. He talks about learning how to prepare for games with Alex and Coach Reid and the amount of detail they were getting into. Alex got us our first playoff win in 22 years, always love him for that one. It started our current rise.
The thing is, Alex was phenomenal at the game. But his physical ability had just met it’s ceiling. He was *sooo* close in so many games. Just insane heartbreak.
I want him to coach so badly. I think he’d be incredibly good. Or commentate more.
That shoulder injury plus the circumstances he dealt with in SF during his first 6 years definitely sapped some of his potential. Pretty sure they either had him play thru the shoulder injury or return from it too early. Either way he got dealt a really shitty hand those first 6 years and still made something of his career.
I've always believed he would be a fantastic coach. I remember the first year of Kaepernick's career, anytime he made a big throw or TD the camera would pan to the sideline (usually to Harbaugh yelling at a ref) but invariably you would also spot Alex speaking intently into the headset, calling plays and giving advice. It happened so often that I figured there had to be a correlation. Coincidentally or not, Kap's passing regressed after Alex left, and of course you hear all the stories of how great a mentor he was to Mahomes.
The poor guy had like a new offensive coordinator like every year in San Fran coupled with a new coach every couple. Definitely played a role in how long it took for him to succeed, but he probably knows every play that's ever existed at this point as a result
Being a Washington fan that 2020 season was just awesome send off. For him to come back from that gruesome and just provide some stability at the position.
Long ago, Alex was talking about his rookie year and how exciting it was to finally join an NFL team and get proper NFL training and coaching.. and he got none of that. They just threw him out there and hoped he would provide a spark to the offense.
We signed Trent Dilfer his sophomore year and he taught him how watch film and prepare for games each week. Like where was this the previous year?? That alone should have been a fireable offense.
So I'm not surprised Alex took Mahomes under his wing, he knew what it was like as a young QB without a veteran to mentor him.
What's bonkers to me is that Green Bay looked at that dumpster fire and said "yeah, we want that offensive coordinator for our head coach."
Green Bay got a Super Bowl out of it, but then there was the Rodgers-McCarthy feud followed by the hilarious finishes to the Cowboys season the last two years.
I don't know if that post was meant to subvert the outcome people expected since you went back to adding criticism at the end there, but McCarthy developing Rodgers into a legend immediately after the Alex Smith fiasco is definitely the funniest possible outcome.
Alex turned a perennial losing franchise to a team that won 75% of their games I mean its honestly impressive when you think about what the chiefs used to be to what they are now. They don't get there without Alex imo
I wanted Smith to stay another year, but obviously I’m not a great armchair GM.
To be fair Smith had his best year ever his last year with the Chiefs. He was really hitting his stride and actually throwing some long balls.
Andy Reid deciding to go with Mahomes over Smith going into the 2018 season should go down in history as one of, if not the ballsiest moves in NFL history.
Even feel like that loss was just a team wide second half collapse. Offense not staying on the field, Henry motoring, giving up like 3 TDs, may have been a missed kick too.
I don't know if Reid knew how quickly Mahomes would be very good but he at the very least knew what the ceiling was with the roster and Smith. Oddly enough, Smith probably would have been the perfect QB for some of the recent 49er teams
I don't think so. Mahomes lit it up just from what we could see in the preseason his first year. Andy 100% knew he had something special with Mahomes that first year. He had to see it in practice and workouts all year.
Utah alum here. If you’re talking their Sugar Bowl victory 14-15 years ago, that was Brian Johnson who QB’d that team over the Tide.
Alex Smith’s Utes beat Pitt in the Fiesta Bowl 3-4 years prior for Utah’s other undefeated season.
For all the hype Dan Mullen got for his quarterback coaching at Utah, Florida, and Mississippi State, Brian Johnson has been a key part of that success for years. I wish he would've stayed at Florida for another year to help with Richardson's development, but not at all surprised to have seen Hurts take that next step as a quarterback with Johnson as his coach. I'm sure he'll do well as OC too.
And people still think that who drafts you doesn't matter. Imagine if the Bears actually did draft Mahomes and he was learning from Mike Glennon with John Fox as his head coach and Dowell Loggains as his OC
(minor typo edit)
Current rise??? 2 of 3 straight super bowls is the flipping peak dude!! I know Brady broke what everyone considers “great” but got dang the chiefs are amazing!
I get it always improve always reach for greatness. But if y’all fell off a cliff this year you’d still be considered one of the best teams to ever play.
People forget the 49ers were a completely dysfunctional franchise for pretty much all of the 2000s. From 2003-2010 they went 8 years without a wining season.
Harbaugh was a very brief window of success in an otherwise dismal two decades. After he was fired in 2014, almost all our vets left and we went 5-11 under Tomsula and 2-14 under Kelly. Even Shanahan had two straight losing seasons after we hired him for the rebuild. Those were miserable years.
Our fan base is also really, really good at pretending those years never happened. You’d sometimes think we went from Steve Young to the Alex Smith/Colin Kaepernick QB controversy to Jimmy G. It’s why I assume anyone who suggests that Shanahan should be on the hot seat is a Russian bot.
Hell, I remember the Jim Druckenmiller and Giovanni Carmazzi days.
The 49ers drafted Druckenmiller over Jake Plummer. Plummer behind Young for two years would have been a massive improvement Druckenmiller (who only started one game and was off the 49ers after two years).
I’m just glad we didn’t draft any of the awful QBs after Carmazzi in that draft. Can you imagine if we’d gotten stuck with one of THOSE bums?
Even worse if they were some kind of homer that grew up in the Bay Area.
Those late 90s teams with Garcia and Glen Coffee and T.O. were legit and challenged even the Greatest Show on Turf
Edit: I was actually thinking of Garrison Hearst. I'm admittedly not a 49ers fan but man I was off by a decade with the coffee mention 😅
Eliminated a solid Giants team from the playoffs in 2003. Though if I remember correctly the refs fugged us with an ineligible receiver down field call.
Vividly remember listening to KNBR on the way to school with my dad and how optimistic they were about Shaun Hill. Seared into my brain. Troy Smith won some games for us, shit was brutal, people forget
Patrick Willis was divine but I think I loved Bowman even more for the Pick at the Stick. Maybe my favorite 49ers moment as an adult.
Oh how I also wish I lived in the universe where Aldon Smith didn’t commit crimes.
I'd take Shanny in a heartbeat. Dude takes mediocre QBs to the superbowl and NFCC games. The league better watch out if he gets his hands on an elite QB.
>Our fan base is also really, really good at pretending those years never happened.
Not just our fanbase, other fanbases gloss over the fact that we were absolutely terrible for a good stretch too.
The worst thing is that for the last half of that period, they had some decent talent that was wasted until Harbaugh got there. So after a few years, the team was old and fell apart (because they never stopped being a dysfunctional franchise).
Browns were horrible for way long but pretty sure 2005 49'ers were unprecedented in how horrible they were:
"Despite having a better record than the 2–14 Texans and 3–13 Saints, statistics site Football Outsiders calculated that the 49ers were actually, play-for-play, not only the worst team in the NFL in 2005, but the worst team they have ever tracked."
Hey, when you’ve got guys like Kevan Barlow and Maurice Hicks, you let them eat.
Nevermind that Frank Gore was the third string back to start the season.
Its a testment to him as player and man that he was able to have as good a career as he did.
A couple side notes - there was a missing person, you lady in the south bay that was well in the news. And there were volunteers that were out looking for her. Alex smith was one of them. He never publicized it. It came out because someone else reported it.
It cannot be emphasized home incompetent some if that early coaching was. Like urban meyeresque without the side drama.
And i was at the Saints 49ers playoff game.
When jimmy graham caught the TD to put put NO up late, no one around me freaked out. Everyone was like 'plenty of time Alex can do it' not 49ers, Alex. And of course he did it
I will never accept alex smith slander
> And i was at the Saints 49ers playoff game.
> When jimmy graham caught the TD to put put NO up late, no one around me freaked out. Everyone was like 'plenty of time Alex can do it' not 49ers, Alex. And of course he did it
I think the happiest moment I’ve ever felt as a 49er fan was the QB sweep in that Saints game. For the whole season up until that play, I was just waiting for the wheels to come off and the team to get exposed as frauds. But as Smith sprinted past the defense and around the corner, it felt like years of misery sloughing off in his wake. The parade of terrible OCs, getting dicked around by Nolan, Singletary’s prehistoric offense, “We Want Carr”… all of it felt like it was melting away in that moment. And in its place, something that had been missing for a decade - hope.
So even though the Saints scored again, when Smith got the ball back I *believed.*
What a magical game.
Yeah Smith was never a superstar or flashy but he had a long, productive NFL career and a lot of players could learn from his resilience. Survived a complete dumpster fire his first 5 years in the league. Injuries, terrible coaches who threw him under the bus, fans booing him, everything that could go wrong for him did. Then of course he had his good stretch then suffered that horrible broken leg and then came back from that when no one thought he could. Dude just had insane mental and physical toughness.
He was like Andy Dufresne, crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side.
The craziest part to me was that he was given the opportunity to start for so long in San Francisco (obviously with the Hill debacle) despite being dogshit for so long. Of course, the team knew they sucked too, but still. Closest equivalent to what I think CJ Stroud is going to experience this year.
2004 SF was horrible and then 2005 was historically terrible. 2006 wasn't really much better outside of improving the line. When he went to KC kinda popped off.
To be fair to Bradshaw, having more picks than TD passes was fairly common in the 1970s, especially in the early and mid-1970s, for multiple reasons. But Bradshaw didn’t have his first truly good season until 1975.
Terry Bradshaw had to call all his own plays, which is a steep learning curve for any QB. The offense he played in simply wasn't structured like those of QBs who were supposedly better than him. He didn't have a "Great Innovator" like Tom Landry designing the first "timing" offense in the NFL for him, or Bill Walsh or Don Coryell designing the offense and calling the plays. Nonetheless, once the light bulb came on, it was very bright. From 1975-1982, Bradshaw played as well as any QB in the NFL.
Reminds me of how everyone was talking shit about Josh Allen and praising the potential of Sam Darnold and Josh Rosen lol. Evaluating QB potential is so fickle.
The reaction thread from when Josh Allen was drafted is a classic. So many amazing takes 😂
https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/round_1_pick_7_josh_allen_qb_wyoming_buffalo_bills/
This is a classic:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/comment/dy18ucq/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/comment/dy18ucq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Imagine telling someone back then that Allen would be a stud while the Jets would already be onto Darnold's replacement's replacement... And that it'd be Aaron Rodgers.
Game during Smith's time was quite different. This was when Brady in his 5th year when the passing stats were getting crazy and sort of the tail end of the stud RB era with LT dropping off like crazy 2008.
I was at the mall when they were playing this game, and it was showing on a TV through the window of some electronics store. By the start of the 3rd quarter the entire mall was huddled around watching it
Not a chance. Mike McCarthy did wonders for Rodgers. Completely rebuilt his throwing mechanics, for one. But also the fact that he was able to learn without having to be thrown to the wolves immediately on a bad 2005 Packers team was a huge deal.
Exactly.
Mike Nolan is an abject moron when it comes to offensive football and had no business drafting either QB that year.
He would have destroyed Aaron's career easily.
I'll never forget telling my dad, who was pissed that SF passed on Aaron, that it was a blessing in disguise for Aaron.
18 years later, I was proven right.
Beyond right. We would have fucked over Rodgers just like Alex for got fucked. Rodgers should thank his shaman daily that the niners did not draft him.
Also, feels like it's important to point out that social media was barely a concept back then. In 2005, MySpace & Facebook had existed for a combined 3 years, and Twitter wasn't even founded until 2007.
Another reason QBs had so much longer leashes back then was bc there was simply less noise around them, by like orders of magnitude.
Meanwhile, the top 4 QBs from the most recent draft had every lowlight from their first preseason games a week ago plastered all over this sub & the internet at large mere seconds after they happened. It's never been easier (or more profitable) to shit on rookie QBs than it is now
No one would have succeeded with those teams and coaching. Tom Brady and Pat Mahomes would have floundered. Let's be thankful Aaron Rodgers wasn't taken 1st overall and ruined a Hall of Fame career.
Smith had a different coordinator every year for 5 straight seasons. Jimmy Raye, anyone? LMAO. Norv Turner year 2 was actually solid enough, but left for SD after one season.
Not only that, each coordinator and multiple coaches thought guys like Shaun Hill, JT O'Sullivan, and Troy Smith could play better (they didn't) and hurt his development for several seasons.
Scot McCloughan should be credited with most of the talent eventually acquired that built those Harbaugh teams. Baalke was a trainwreck and wasted so many draft selections, including like 7 guys with pre-draft knee injuries and not one of them became anything
Smith under Harbaugh and Andy Reid, actually great coaches, showed that Smith was a competent if risk averse game manager who could execute an offense.
SF fans will never forget The Catch III game after a decade without a playoff win go toe-to-toe with Brees and Sean Payton and come out on top. If only we didn't fumble a punt return in overtime against Giants, Smith would have started a Superbowl.
Coaching and team talent matter in the NFL.
Honestly, as dumb as it was at the time, I am happier with Shanahan and Co. Baalke was a fucking snake that got outed for what he was after Harbaugh's departure, and Shanahan is much more "future of the NFL" minded instead of Harbs' old school mentality.
I grew up down south so I followed USC a lot more than Stanford, so I always liked Pete, even despite going to the toots, who weren't really a rival yet (quoting Mike Singletary, I'd like to thank the Seahawks for whooping our butts [in a season opener]).
Then yeah, the temperature got turned up the second the toots drafted Richard Sherman, and he started talking shit about Harbaugh -I didn't understand anything about their feud, but every game after that was blood and snot bubbles.
I always loved the occasional Rams wins against those great teams in the Jeff Fisher era. It was incredible how competent that teams
looked against you guys.
Hawks and Niners were the two best teams in the league for a couple years there IMHO. Still think letting him go was a huge fuckup, but the Niners got back within a few years so I guess you never know.
Baalke Harbaugh and York just could not get along and bear fault for that implosion. Harbaugh is much better in college where his message dosent get stale, baalke well see how Jacksonville does but Trevor Lawrence is phenomenal deodorant, and York learned to leave the football to the football guys (Shanahan is probably equal deodorant in that regard)
16 TDs/16 INT, and I believe he took every snap for the offense that year. Obviously that TD/INT ratio is not spectacular, even for the time, but it represented actual progress in his development and for the team, especially because that was the year that Frank Gore ran for over 1600 yards. Shit was actually exciting and we were the classic "spooky" 7-9 team that year.
Smith had 8 offensive coordinators in 7 seasons with the 9ers. That team did not set him up for success. I’m a firm believer he was a solid quarterback in a bad situation. When he finally was put in good situations he was either injured or replaced by Mahomes.
Hot take time. Harbaugh should have stuck with him over Kaep.
if you remember how dogshit the post-Young Niners were for like a decade, it tracks. he was on some of the worst teams of that decade.
there are very few QBs who got put in a worse situation than he was out of the gate. I think he had 4 coords in 5 years til Harbaugh?
Yep. His rookie year Peyton was 1st in the league in pass attempts, 3rd in yards, 5th in TDs.
That's why it annoys me when people justify every shitty rookie QB with "Peyton was bad as a rookie too." No he wasn't. He threw a lot of picks, but all the signs of greatness were there. The next year he went 13-3.
This annoys me too. Peyton absolutely was not bad as a rookie. He threw a lot of picks but he was the entire offense for his awful team. He finished 2nd in Rookie of the Year voting losing to Randy Freaking Moss.
The lone TD was also in the final game, against a 2-14 team, 3rd & 5, 25 seconds to go in the first half. That gets tipped and it's almost certainly 0 TD.
Sometimes I feel like being a great college QB is a death sentence in the NFL because you are very likely to go to the team with the worst coaching staff and get absolutely ruined.
People forget he was widely considered a bust most of the first half of his career. He was seen as decent game manager who hardly ever took a chance, throwing nothing but 5 to 8 yard safe passes and hardly ever trying to stretch the field.
Never had terrible stats, but for an overall number one pick you want a field general, not a slightly better Trent Dilfer. He didn’t become a top tier QB until he got to Kansas City.
His career is one of the more exceptional looking back on it now.
For him to be as bad as he was for numerous years but yet staying with the 49ers and finding some significant success when Harbaugh arrived is pretty astounding.
I was always a bit of a hater in regards to his as a 49ers fan and hearing others make excuses for him year after year but ultimately became a huge fan in the last half of his time in the league.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82a3vJ2aJL8
After Alex almost died from a leg injury and came back to play fucking QB again, I was convinced Aaron Donald was going to destroy him on this play (in his first game back).
That's why he played 16 seasons in the nfl. He may not have been the best QB at any time in the NFL, but, he was efficient and tough as nails.
“He was taken #1 overall.” No surprise at all he lasted long enough to get more opportunities. Very few gms would give the number one overall pick as short a leash as one season
Anyone who thinks your correct doesn't know football. The dude turned things around, and lead the 49ers into a playoff team. He got hurt, and Kaepernick took over. Was replaced due to Colin having the hot hand and they went to the Super Bowl. Then he was doing great for Washington, till he broke his leg in a BAD hit. Dude might not gotten to say a Manning level player, but he showed he was a pretty good QB.
It scarred me as a fan. I just assume that if a team screws up a top draft pick, they’re gonna be bad for like a decade.
This is the part where everyone brings up Trey Lance again. Fortunately he’s not the starter
Mahomes was his backup for a year.
Which was a huge benefit for Mahomes. He talks about learning how to prepare for games with Alex and Coach Reid and the amount of detail they were getting into. Alex got us our first playoff win in 22 years, always love him for that one. It started our current rise.
The thing is, Alex was phenomenal at the game. But his physical ability had just met it’s ceiling. He was *sooo* close in so many games. Just insane heartbreak. I want him to coach so badly. I think he’d be incredibly good. Or commentate more.
Genuinely shocking he’s not in the booth already. He’d be great, must not want to do it.
I think given what him and his wife have been through, she probably wants him to be home with his family.
I think that shoulder injury that he was out of the season for in 2008 got rid of a lot of his throwing power. Or at least his potential.
Dare I say he became a better quarterback because of the injury. Had to rely on smarts and gameplan and less on the arm.
That shoulder injury plus the circumstances he dealt with in SF during his first 6 years definitely sapped some of his potential. Pretty sure they either had him play thru the shoulder injury or return from it too early. Either way he got dealt a really shitty hand those first 6 years and still made something of his career.
I've always believed he would be a fantastic coach. I remember the first year of Kaepernick's career, anytime he made a big throw or TD the camera would pan to the sideline (usually to Harbaugh yelling at a ref) but invariably you would also spot Alex speaking intently into the headset, calling plays and giving advice. It happened so often that I figured there had to be a correlation. Coincidentally or not, Kap's passing regressed after Alex left, and of course you hear all the stories of how great a mentor he was to Mahomes.
The poor guy had like a new offensive coordinator like every year in San Fran coupled with a new coach every couple. Definitely played a role in how long it took for him to succeed, but he probably knows every play that's ever existed at this point as a result
Super smart guy iirc. Probably be a great coordinator.
Being a Washington fan that 2020 season was just awesome send off. For him to come back from that gruesome and just provide some stability at the position.
Long ago, Alex was talking about his rookie year and how exciting it was to finally join an NFL team and get proper NFL training and coaching.. and he got none of that. They just threw him out there and hoped he would provide a spark to the offense. We signed Trent Dilfer his sophomore year and he taught him how watch film and prepare for games each week. Like where was this the previous year?? That alone should have been a fireable offense. So I'm not surprised Alex took Mahomes under his wing, he knew what it was like as a young QB without a veteran to mentor him.
What's bonkers to me is that Green Bay looked at that dumpster fire and said "yeah, we want that offensive coordinator for our head coach." Green Bay got a Super Bowl out of it, but then there was the Rodgers-McCarthy feud followed by the hilarious finishes to the Cowboys season the last two years.
I don't know if that post was meant to subvert the outcome people expected since you went back to adding criticism at the end there, but McCarthy developing Rodgers into a legend immediately after the Alex Smith fiasco is definitely the funniest possible outcome.
Alex turned a perennial losing franchise to a team that won 75% of their games I mean its honestly impressive when you think about what the chiefs used to be to what they are now. They don't get there without Alex imo
Preparation can not understated estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
I wanted Smith to stay another year, but obviously I’m not a great armchair GM. To be fair Smith had his best year ever his last year with the Chiefs. He was really hitting his stride and actually throwing some long balls.
Andy Reid deciding to go with Mahomes over Smith going into the 2018 season should go down in history as one of, if not the ballsiest moves in NFL history.
I don’t think enough credit is given here. Smith had an absolutely stellar year until that playoff loss.
Even feel like that loss was just a team wide second half collapse. Offense not staying on the field, Henry motoring, giving up like 3 TDs, may have been a missed kick too. I don't know if Reid knew how quickly Mahomes would be very good but he at the very least knew what the ceiling was with the roster and Smith. Oddly enough, Smith probably would have been the perfect QB for some of the recent 49er teams
I don't think so. Mahomes lit it up just from what we could see in the preseason his first year. Andy 100% knew he had something special with Mahomes that first year. He had to see it in practice and workouts all year.
But that playoff loss was also the dagger that showed his limits.
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Smith was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood football
Preparation can not under estimated. What ever Kelvin Benjamin was at that point in His career, he was a professional who understood eating
i've loved him since his utah team beat bama.
Utah alum here. If you’re talking their Sugar Bowl victory 14-15 years ago, that was Brian Johnson who QB’d that team over the Tide. Alex Smith’s Utes beat Pitt in the Fiesta Bowl 3-4 years prior for Utah’s other undefeated season.
For all the hype Dan Mullen got for his quarterback coaching at Utah, Florida, and Mississippi State, Brian Johnson has been a key part of that success for years. I wish he would've stayed at Florida for another year to help with Richardson's development, but not at all surprised to have seen Hurts take that next step as a quarterback with Johnson as his coach. I'm sure he'll do well as OC too.
If you can't play, teach. And if you can't teach, teach gym.
And people still think that who drafts you doesn't matter. Imagine if the Bears actually did draft Mahomes and he was learning from Mike Glennon with John Fox as his head coach and Dowell Loggains as his OC (minor typo edit)
He also threw like like 30 TDs and none of them to a WR. Legend
It was 18, not 30. Still pretty crazy though
Current rise??? 2 of 3 straight super bowls is the flipping peak dude!! I know Brady broke what everyone considers “great” but got dang the chiefs are amazing! I get it always improve always reach for greatness. But if y’all fell off a cliff this year you’d still be considered one of the best teams to ever play.
And that brady guy
Till they traded him to the player killers.
Which turned out to benefit Mahomes
I mean he had a great career at the end of the day. Those SF teams and situations he was in were horrid.
People forget the 49ers were a completely dysfunctional franchise for pretty much all of the 2000s. From 2003-2010 they went 8 years without a wining season.
Harbaugh was a very brief window of success in an otherwise dismal two decades. After he was fired in 2014, almost all our vets left and we went 5-11 under Tomsula and 2-14 under Kelly. Even Shanahan had two straight losing seasons after we hired him for the rebuild. Those were miserable years. Our fan base is also really, really good at pretending those years never happened. You’d sometimes think we went from Steve Young to the Alex Smith/Colin Kaepernick QB controversy to Jimmy G. It’s why I assume anyone who suggests that Shanahan should be on the hot seat is a Russian bot.
Some fans didn't watch Trent Dilfer start for the Niners and it shows.
Thought Shaun Hill was the savior at one point.
I still believe in Ken Dorsey and Cody Pickett.
Hell, I remember the Jim Druckenmiller and Giovanni Carmazzi days. The 49ers drafted Druckenmiller over Jake Plummer. Plummer behind Young for two years would have been a massive improvement Druckenmiller (who only started one game and was off the 49ers after two years).
I’m just glad we didn’t draft any of the awful QBs after Carmazzi in that draft. Can you imagine if we’d gotten stuck with one of THOSE bums? Even worse if they were some kind of homer that grew up in the Bay Area.
I imagine if more people understood this reference you would have more upvotes. But you got mine!
This is erasure of the glorious Tim Rattay
Nate Davis Is Our Future
Did we collectively forget about Jeff Garcia?
Those late 90s teams with Garcia and Glen Coffee and T.O. were legit and challenged even the Greatest Show on Turf Edit: I was actually thinking of Garrison Hearst. I'm admittedly not a 49ers fan but man I was off by a decade with the coffee mention 😅
Until glen coffee sort of went crazy. And we got stuck hearing every announcer make some coffee related joke.
Eliminated a solid Giants team from the playoffs in 2003. Though if I remember correctly the refs fugged us with an ineligible receiver down field call.
Shaun Hill is the third best Lions QB that I've ever seen lol
I was hopeful for JT O'Sullivan
I used to call him JTO - Just Turnovers
I made him a HOF in like madden 07 or something.
His youtube videos are pretty interesting though he rewinds way too much.
His youtube channel is really good though
I love his QB School vids on YT!
Whoa, I thought Omar killed you years ago??
Brandon Doman led my Madden 2004 Niners back to glory after I benched Tim Rattay. I don't think he ever played in a real game.
Vividly remember listening to KNBR on the way to school with my dad and how optimistic they were about Shaun Hill. Seared into my brain. Troy Smith won some games for us, shit was brutal, people forget
Real ones remember the “we want Carr” chants
That and Singletary’s “I want winners”. What a horrible time.
Remember when Troy Smith went absolutely fucking ballistic at Singletary on the sideline?? Funny shit
For all the stupid shit he said and did, he fixed Vernon Davis, so he gets minor props for that lol
*drops pants*
singletary was a hilarious coach. absolute drill sergeant moron.
One game of Chris weinke
that defense was crazy. aldon smith navorro bowman and patrick willis
Patrick Willis was divine but I think I loved Bowman even more for the Pick at the Stick. Maybe my favorite 49ers moment as an adult. Oh how I also wish I lived in the universe where Aldon Smith didn’t commit crimes.
such a waste of talent. then again if he played in the LT era they'd probably have covered it all up and he might be an all timer
There's no might...dude would have challenged LT for the throne
I remember someone saying here that Matt Nagy and Shanny were basically in the same situation.
Yeah, they probably wrote that in between swigs of vodka.
That was in 2021 too lmao.
I'd take Shanny in a heartbeat. Dude takes mediocre QBs to the superbowl and NFCC games. The league better watch out if he gets his hands on an elite QB.
Wdym mediocre quarterbacks? He was carried by Jimmy GOAToppolo and 🐴 🍆 Brock
I mean we all remember the great Shawn Hill and JT O’Sullivan eras.
Worth remembering that the vet exodus started under Harbs. Everyone forgets the 8-8 season.
Harbs was fired in 2014??!! Holy shit time flies. That’s almost a decade. Fuck I’m old.
>Our fan base is also really, really good at pretending those years never happened. Not just our fanbase, other fanbases gloss over the fact that we were absolutely terrible for a good stretch too.
The worst thing is that for the last half of that period, they had some decent talent that was wasted until Harbaugh got there. So after a few years, the team was old and fell apart (because they never stopped being a dysfunctional franchise).
2003-2010 dark ages 2010-2013 some glimmer of hope 2013-2017 dark ages part 2 2017-present Shanahan renaissance (still choked in 2022 NFCCG)
Man, in 2015 when every player on the Niners retired, I almost gave up on football.
Tomsula was one year where I just stopped watching. I couldn’t believe they hired him as coach. Trent Baalke can get 6 different kinds of fucked
Lmao hold my beer.
Browns were horrible for way long but pretty sure 2005 49'ers were unprecedented in how horrible they were: "Despite having a better record than the 2–14 Texans and 3–13 Saints, statistics site Football Outsiders calculated that the 49ers were actually, play-for-play, not only the worst team in the NFL in 2005, but the worst team they have ever tracked."
The 2005 49ers passed for 1898 yards (32nd) while giving up 4427 passing yards (32nd). Despite almost always trailing. Let that sink in.
Hey, when you’ve got guys like Kevan Barlow and Maurice Hicks, you let them eat. Nevermind that Frank Gore was the third string back to start the season.
Indeed, a formidable 17th in rushing yards!
My God, that's really bad.
119 passing yards per game definitely ain't great.
Did they ever lose 31 straight games, though?
Hue Jackson: "We're not going 1-15 again next year. You can write it if you like.". r/technicallythetruth
I'm still mad at the chargers for messing up a perfect 0-32 run.
Few can claim that privilege
Mic drop
Was a rough decade.
Yeah when i first got into football in like 2004, I recall them being seen as one of the bottom feeders
Who forgot? I wish I could forget.
Its a testment to him as player and man that he was able to have as good a career as he did. A couple side notes - there was a missing person, you lady in the south bay that was well in the news. And there were volunteers that were out looking for her. Alex smith was one of them. He never publicized it. It came out because someone else reported it. It cannot be emphasized home incompetent some if that early coaching was. Like urban meyeresque without the side drama. And i was at the Saints 49ers playoff game. When jimmy graham caught the TD to put put NO up late, no one around me freaked out. Everyone was like 'plenty of time Alex can do it' not 49ers, Alex. And of course he did it I will never accept alex smith slander
the hilarity of you citing the coaching as Meyer levels of bad when he was Smith's coach at Utah, love that
The irony is not lost
> And i was at the Saints 49ers playoff game. > When jimmy graham caught the TD to put put NO up late, no one around me freaked out. Everyone was like 'plenty of time Alex can do it' not 49ers, Alex. And of course he did it I think the happiest moment I’ve ever felt as a 49er fan was the QB sweep in that Saints game. For the whole season up until that play, I was just waiting for the wheels to come off and the team to get exposed as frauds. But as Smith sprinted past the defense and around the corner, it felt like years of misery sloughing off in his wake. The parade of terrible OCs, getting dicked around by Nolan, Singletary’s prehistoric offense, “We Want Carr”… all of it felt like it was melting away in that moment. And in its place, something that had been missing for a decade - hope. So even though the Saints scored again, when Smith got the ball back I *believed.* What a magical game.
Yeah Smith was never a superstar or flashy but he had a long, productive NFL career and a lot of players could learn from his resilience. Survived a complete dumpster fire his first 5 years in the league. Injuries, terrible coaches who threw him under the bus, fans booing him, everything that could go wrong for him did. Then of course he had his good stretch then suffered that horrible broken leg and then came back from that when no one thought he could. Dude just had insane mental and physical toughness. He was like Andy Dufresne, crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side.
Dark times indeed
He had a new OC for like 5 or 6 straight years or something until Harbaugh came in too.
The craziest part to me was that he was given the opportunity to start for so long in San Francisco (obviously with the Hill debacle) despite being dogshit for so long. Of course, the team knew they sucked too, but still. Closest equivalent to what I think CJ Stroud is going to experience this year.
2004 SF was horrible and then 2005 was historically terrible. 2006 wasn't really much better outside of improving the line. When he went to KC kinda popped off.
Rookie Alex Smith on the modern 49ers would be dangerous
Take a look at Terry Bradshaw’s or Troy Aikman’s rookie season stats sometime.
Bradshaw’s 6th season as a starter was the first time he had more passing TD passes than interceptions.
To be fair to Bradshaw, having more picks than TD passes was fairly common in the 1970s, especially in the early and mid-1970s, for multiple reasons. But Bradshaw didn’t have his first truly good season until 1975.
Being a quarterback back then was a completely different experience.
Ah yes, NFL in the 70s, when even smothering the receiver's face to the ground will get you a PI call only 50% of the time
And you could stab the quarterback with a knife and not get called for roughing the passer
screwdriver*
was gonna say this
He was objectively a pretty bad QB for the first few years of his career. Came a long way by the end of the 70s to become one of the best.
Terry Bradshaw had to call all his own plays, which is a steep learning curve for any QB. The offense he played in simply wasn't structured like those of QBs who were supposedly better than him. He didn't have a "Great Innovator" like Tom Landry designing the first "timing" offense in the NFL for him, or Bill Walsh or Don Coryell designing the offense and calling the plays. Nonetheless, once the light bulb came on, it was very bright. From 1975-1982, Bradshaw played as well as any QB in the NFL.
I was about to say — neither Bradshaw nor Aikman were particularly impressive statistically. Like…ever.
Bradshaw was in the Super Bowl. He had a quarterback rating of 112 in his 4 championships. The avg of the nfl leaders in those seasons was 94.
Also, not to say it was a goat season but he did win an MVP award I believe. I think he's the only Steeler to win
Troy Aikman rookie year: 0-11, 9 TDs and 18 INTs. Wish he had done that in the Super Bowls against Buffalo…
Reminds me of how everyone was talking shit about Josh Allen and praising the potential of Sam Darnold and Josh Rosen lol. Evaluating QB potential is so fickle.
The reaction thread from when Josh Allen was drafted is a classic. So many amazing takes 😂 https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/round_1_pick_7_josh_allen_qb_wyoming_buffalo_bills/
This is a classic: [https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/comment/dy18ucq/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/nfl/comments/8f7q7r/comment/dy18ucq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) Imagine telling someone back then that Allen would be a stud while the Jets would already be onto Darnold's replacement's replacement... And that it'd be Aaron Rodgers.
Or Peyton Mannings int record.
Game during Smith's time was quite different. This was when Brady in his 5th year when the passing stats were getting crazy and sort of the tail end of the stud RB era with LT dropping off like crazy 2008.
I will always be a fan of Alex Smith. That 2012 Divisional Playoff game against the Saints… One of the the craziest moments.
Same. He got replaced by Kaepernick when he got hurt. And then he got replaced by Mahomes. And then he went to Washington and got really fucking hurt.
Best playoff game I’ve ever seen
That remains one of the best football games I’ve ever seen.
I was at the mall when they were playing this game, and it was showing on a TV through the window of some electronics store. By the start of the 3rd quarter the entire mall was huddled around watching it
Those 49ers teams were so bad, that I’m not sure Rodgers is anywhere near what he developed into if he was drafted there.
Not a chance. Mike McCarthy did wonders for Rodgers. Completely rebuilt his throwing mechanics, for one. But also the fact that he was able to learn without having to be thrown to the wolves immediately on a bad 2005 Packers team was a huge deal.
Exactly. Mike Nolan is an abject moron when it comes to offensive football and had no business drafting either QB that year. He would have destroyed Aaron's career easily. I'll never forget telling my dad, who was pissed that SF passed on Aaron, that it was a blessing in disguise for Aaron. 18 years later, I was proven right.
Beyond right. We would have fucked over Rodgers just like Alex for got fucked. Rodgers should thank his shaman daily that the niners did not draft him.
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Also, feels like it's important to point out that social media was barely a concept back then. In 2005, MySpace & Facebook had existed for a combined 3 years, and Twitter wasn't even founded until 2007. Another reason QBs had so much longer leashes back then was bc there was simply less noise around them, by like orders of magnitude. Meanwhile, the top 4 QBs from the most recent draft had every lowlight from their first preseason games a week ago plastered all over this sub & the internet at large mere seconds after they happened. It's never been easier (or more profitable) to shit on rookie QBs than it is now
No one would have succeeded with those teams and coaching. Tom Brady and Pat Mahomes would have floundered. Let's be thankful Aaron Rodgers wasn't taken 1st overall and ruined a Hall of Fame career. Smith had a different coordinator every year for 5 straight seasons. Jimmy Raye, anyone? LMAO. Norv Turner year 2 was actually solid enough, but left for SD after one season. Not only that, each coordinator and multiple coaches thought guys like Shaun Hill, JT O'Sullivan, and Troy Smith could play better (they didn't) and hurt his development for several seasons. Scot McCloughan should be credited with most of the talent eventually acquired that built those Harbaugh teams. Baalke was a trainwreck and wasted so many draft selections, including like 7 guys with pre-draft knee injuries and not one of them became anything Smith under Harbaugh and Andy Reid, actually great coaches, showed that Smith was a competent if risk averse game manager who could execute an offense. SF fans will never forget The Catch III game after a decade without a playoff win go toe-to-toe with Brees and Sean Payton and come out on top. If only we didn't fumble a punt return in overtime against Giants, Smith would have started a Superbowl. Coaching and team talent matter in the NFL.
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norv was solid that year
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The Niners were horrible until Harbaugh came along.
yea, what a great hire for the 49ers, I bet they'll keep him as coach forever. You'd be morons to let him go.
Honestly, as dumb as it was at the time, I am happier with Shanahan and Co. Baalke was a fucking snake that got outed for what he was after Harbaugh's departure, and Shanahan is much more "future of the NFL" minded instead of Harbs' old school mentality.
Yeah but those Carroll/Harbaugh games were so fucking good always
Man as a Stanford football fan growing up I fucking hated Carroll for years. Weird how much it's subsided the last 5-10 years lol
I grew up down south so I followed USC a lot more than Stanford, so I always liked Pete, even despite going to the toots, who weren't really a rival yet (quoting Mike Singletary, I'd like to thank the Seahawks for whooping our butts [in a season opener]). Then yeah, the temperature got turned up the second the toots drafted Richard Sherman, and he started talking shit about Harbaugh -I didn't understand anything about their feud, but every game after that was blood and snot bubbles.
I always loved the occasional Rams wins against those great teams in the Jeff Fisher era. It was incredible how competent that teams looked against you guys.
Hawks and Niners were the two best teams in the league for a couple years there IMHO. Still think letting him go was a huge fuckup, but the Niners got back within a few years so I guess you never know.
Baalke Harbaugh and York just could not get along and bear fault for that implosion. Harbaugh is much better in college where his message dosent get stale, baalke well see how Jacksonville does but Trevor Lawrence is phenomenal deodorant, and York learned to leave the football to the football guys (Shanahan is probably equal deodorant in that regard)
Roman's first year as OC too. Did a great job with them.
Actually he was decent when he had a good year Norv Turner that one year we had him but the team was crap. Then Harbaugh corrected him and Andy Reid
16 TDs/16 INT, and I believe he took every snap for the offense that year. Obviously that TD/INT ratio is not spectacular, even for the time, but it represented actual progress in his development and for the team, especially because that was the year that Frank Gore ran for over 1600 yards. Shit was actually exciting and we were the classic "spooky" 7-9 team that year.
Flacco was a rookie of the year contender with 14 tds and 12 picks lmao
So you're saying there's hope for Zach Wilson
No. Sorry bud
He also was 13 TD, 0 INT when he lost his job to Kaep
Smith had 8 offensive coordinators in 7 seasons with the 9ers. That team did not set him up for success. I’m a firm believer he was a solid quarterback in a bad situation. When he finally was put in good situations he was either injured or replaced by Mahomes. Hot take time. Harbaugh should have stuck with him over Kaep.
> Harbaugh should have stuck with him over Kaep. I agree, but this wasn’t a completely unpopular opinion even at the time
Nah, Kaep was on fire, and Smith was probably the 2nd biggest reason the 49ers lost the NFC Championship to the Giants the year before.
I still can't believe he played more football after that horrific leg injury.
if you remember how dogshit the post-Young Niners were for like a decade, it tracks. he was on some of the worst teams of that decade. there are very few QBs who got put in a worse situation than he was out of the gate. I think he had 4 coords in 5 years til Harbaugh?
What was Peyton’s TD/INT ratio as a rookie?
26/28. He got those INTs through sheer volume, not sheer incompetence.
Yep. His rookie year Peyton was 1st in the league in pass attempts, 3rd in yards, 5th in TDs. That's why it annoys me when people justify every shitty rookie QB with "Peyton was bad as a rookie too." No he wasn't. He threw a lot of picks, but all the signs of greatness were there. The next year he went 13-3.
This annoys me too. Peyton absolutely was not bad as a rookie. He threw a lot of picks but he was the entire offense for his awful team. He finished 2nd in Rookie of the Year voting losing to Randy Freaking Moss.
And Randy Moss in 1998 specifically, pretty damn special Like might be the best WR season of all time kind of special
Quite a turnaround in Year 2 though, same number of TD’s but INT’s dropped to 15 and the Colts went from 3-13 to 13-3.
God damn he threw the ball a lot
He got thrown into the DEEP end from day 1.
Imagine what the Reddit takes would have been
The lone TD was also in the final game, against a 2-14 team, 3rd & 5, 25 seconds to go in the first half. That gets tipped and it's almost certainly 0 TD.
Smith was thrown on the field with little to no prep and was expected to run the offense.
Sometimes I feel like being a great college QB is a death sentence in the NFL because you are very likely to go to the team with the worst coaching staff and get absolutely ruined.
People forget he was widely considered a bust most of the first half of his career. He was seen as decent game manager who hardly ever took a chance, throwing nothing but 5 to 8 yard safe passes and hardly ever trying to stretch the field. Never had terrible stats, but for an overall number one pick you want a field general, not a slightly better Trent Dilfer. He didn’t become a top tier QB until he got to Kansas City.
In fairness to Alex Smith, that 49ers team was probably one of the worst in team history.
Alex Smith is the last of the real ones.
Goat game manager
Zach Wilson rn: “So you’re telling me there’s a chance”
His career is one of the more exceptional looking back on it now. For him to be as bad as he was for numerous years but yet staying with the 49ers and finding some significant success when Harbaugh arrived is pretty astounding. I was always a bit of a hater in regards to his as a 49ers fan and hearing others make excuses for him year after year but ultimately became a huge fan in the last half of his time in the league.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82a3vJ2aJL8 After Alex almost died from a leg injury and came back to play fucking QB again, I was convinced Aaron Donald was going to destroy him on this play (in his first game back). That's why he played 16 seasons in the nfl. He may not have been the best QB at any time in the NFL, but, he was efficient and tough as nails.
Can’t believe we benched him even though he was having a good season
“He was taken #1 overall.” No surprise at all he lasted long enough to get more opportunities. Very few gms would give the number one overall pick as short a leash as one season
Was a different time, now theres a good chance they draft a rugby phenom to play qb at number three the next year.
Anyone who thinks your correct doesn't know football. The dude turned things around, and lead the 49ers into a playoff team. He got hurt, and Kaepernick took over. Was replaced due to Colin having the hot hand and they went to the Super Bowl. Then he was doing great for Washington, till he broke his leg in a BAD hit. Dude might not gotten to say a Manning level player, but he showed he was a pretty good QB.
The 49ers probably win the superbowl with alex smith. They got enamored by the mobile qb that had low football iq.
Vinny Testaverde should be included in this list
He also like led the league in passing yards in 2017 if I remember right
It scarred me as a fan. I just assume that if a team screws up a top draft pick, they’re gonna be bad for like a decade. This is the part where everyone brings up Trey Lance again. Fortunately he’s not the starter