49ers Legend Issues Warning to Quarterback Brock Purdy: ‘It’s Gonna Hurt’

Getty Brock Purdy, 49ers quarterback

The numbers are very good, there is no denying that. But if the legendary Steve Young has one number he warns 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy to improve upon, it is this: 15.

That is the total rushing attempts Purdy has put forth so far this year, for a total of 31 yards. In the Week 6 loss against Cleveland, it was just three rushes for seven yards, far too few for a sloppy and penalty-strewn game played in bad weather.

Young is warning Purdy: That needs to change in today’s NFL.

“If I think about this game, I’m thinking about the future,” Young said on KNBR this week. “Everyone wants to overanalyze this one game, but I’m thinking about the future, and the things that will allow us to go the places we want to go, Brock is going to have to get on his horse. He’s going to have to go get those yards and make those plays with his legs.

Steve Young Wants 49ers’ Brock Purdy to Play ‘Championship Football’

Steve Young acknowledged that Brock Purdy is a very efficient quarterback for the 49ers. He is completing 67.5% of his passes on the season, and has 10 touchdowns with just one interception. That came in the loss to Cleveland, the first loss of Purdy’s regular-season career. But Purdy is 23^rd among quarterbacks in rushing attempts and 26^th in rushing yardage.

“No longer in championship football be someone who can just stand there and throw it,” Young said. “No matter how good you are, the game is so wide-open today, you’ve seen it in all the big games over the last three or four years, all the championship games and Super Bowls, it’s the quarterbacks going and getting those yards.”

Young has used that criticism on Cincinnati quarterback Joe Burrow before, he noted. But it applies to his old team, too.

“I say that to Brock as well,” Young said. “Brock, at some point, in the bigger games, he’s gonna have to—if he can’t do it, that’s gonna be a really, it’s gonna hurt because the game is that way now. So, I say it to Joe Burrow, I say it to Brock, you’ve got to get on your horse in the big games and the big moments because those yards are out there and you’ve got to go get them.”

Kyle Shanahan: 49ers in Too Many ‘Negative Situations’ vs. Browns

As for Purdy’s coach, Kyle Shanahan noted that one of the big problems in the loss to Cleveland was the difficult situations the team put Purdy in. The Browns were beat up offensively, without quarterback Deshaun Watson and running back Nick Chubb, but defensively, they have one of the league’s best pass rushes and very good defensive backs monitoring the 49ers receivers.

There were plenty of opportunities for Purdy to take up chunks of yardage with his legs, but in long-yardage situations, that was not always advisable.

“We got in some negative situations where we had second-and-long and third-and-long,” Shanahan said this week. “And then with that pass rush and the tight coverages, that makes it really tough on a quarterback. So I think just as a team wholly, just getting into some of those bad situations made Brock’s job a lot tougher. But he mixed it up throughout the game, did a good job. It was tough on film going in and it was tough during the game too.”