Jimmy Garoppolo was protected for three seasons by Joe Staley, who covered the blindside for the San Francisco 49ers from 2007 to 2019.
In his post playing days, Staley has been known in the Bay Area to remain an ardent backer of the signal-caller he went to his last Super Bowl with in the ’19 season.
That, however, slightly changed on the six-time Pro Bowler’s end on Monday, September 26 with an honest take on Garoppolo’s Week 3 performance versus the Denver Broncos.
Telling 3-Word Description
Appearing on the Papa and Lund Show on KNBR in the Bay Area, the 38-year-old Staley did dive into Garoppolo’s late July and August dilemma of not having the 49ers’ playbook, but still was honest in his assessment after the 49ers‘ 11-10 loss.
“It’s easy now hindsight saying like well he didn’t have training camp and all that stuff,” Staley told the show hosts. “He’s coming back from a shoulder injury but yeah, it just wasn’t a great game.”
Then came the next three words…and the most telling.
“He looked off,” Staley said. Continuing with, “Throws weren’t quite there. Even stuff to the sideline. Quick screen passes or swing passes out to the receiver looked high, low, it wasn’t there completely. From my vantage point in the stands, it just wasn’t clicking, and I’ve been there.”
Analyst Dives Into Lapse in Throwing Judgement, Another Brings up Unique Jimmy G Stat
Staley wasn’t the only Ex-player turned analyst who chimed in on Garoppolo’s evening.
Brad Graham of @TheSFNiners was another who became vocally concerned about the state of the 49ers’ offense with Trey Lance out for the year and Garoppolo regaining control.
Graham dove into one particular play that concerns him most about the 49ers moving forward that involved Brandon Aiyuk.
“Likely INT [interception] due to Jimmy locked on slant to [George] Kittle and safety knew it was coming — deflection actually saved 49ers. Safety has zero respect for getting beat deep and it left Aiyuk wide-open down field but Jimmy doesn’t see it,” Graham posted.
That play in question is below.
This type of play is what concerns me most moving forward
Likely INT due to Jimmy locked on slant to Kittle & safety knew it was coming — deflection actually saved 49ers
Safety has zero respect for getting beat deep & it left Aiyuk wide-open down field but Jimmy doesn’t see it
But there was one more Graham pointed out involving a Garoppolo to Aiyuk target. This one was a completed pass. However, Graham pointed out how Jimmy G has had too much of a “lack of consistency between the good and bad plays.” Also to note: Garoppolo was facing only a three-man rush and threw his pass in less than three seconds.
Which leads into a paramount stat brought up by The Athletic’s David Lombardi on the eve of the 49ers’ highly-anticipated NFC title game rematch with the Los Angeles Rams looming. His stat: Garoppolo’s ability to quickly fire the football helped the 49ers’ offense…which was less than 2.5 seconds per pass.
49ers beat Rams twice last season, once coming off an ugly loss to AZ, once playing 2 backup tackles.
That context obviously relevant now.
Garoppolo’s avg time to throw was 2.3s (fastest in NFL) and 2.4s (#3), respectively. SF might need to quicken back up to that. 2.6s at DEN
In a subsequent tweet, Lombardi shared how in the NFC title game, the Rams managed to get Garoppolo’s timing to three seconds — giving L.A. the advantage.
Garoppolo, though, is facing a Rams defense that delivered four quarterback hits and two sacks of the more mobile Kyler Murray. Garoppolo was sacked four times and got hit six times against the Broncos’ rush — which was orchestrated by former Rams safeties coach and passing game coordinator Ejiro Evero. So in all likelihood, the Rams will take elements of Ejiro’s game plan to counter Garoppolo and the Niners.
But as for Staley, he’s hoping that the aftermath of the Denver loss will see a turnaround from his Ex-QB and his former team.
“We’ve had really good teams where just one day it wasn’t there. Offensively hopefully this isn’t the Niners offense we’re going to see the rest of the season. Hopefully, this was just a blip,” Staley said.
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Ex-Teammate of Jimmy Garoppolo Latest to Criticize 49ers QB