Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick is being discussed by the Baltimore Ravens thanks to starter Joe Flacco being expected to miss three to six weeks with a disc issue in his back. Until Thursday, interest in Kaepernick had been very quiet with the Seattle Seahawks being the only team which had brought the quarterback in for a visit.
The 49ers reportedly never had an interest in bringing Kaepernick, who started 11 games for the team in 2016, back for the 2017 season. Had the quarterback not opted out of the final year of his contract in March, the 49ers would have likely cut him to keep from paying the $14.9 million due heading into the 2017 season.
As the 49ers prepare to kick off training camp, head coach Kyle Shanahan met with media on Thursday and discussed why Kaepernick was not seen as a fit for the team.
"I thought with Colin and any quarterback situation it was where do you want to go with your scheme," Shanahan said. "Where do you want to go with your roster? I looked at it solely into where I wanted to go with the offensive scheme. I think Colin's had a lot of success in this league and I think he still can have success, but you've got to commit to a certain type of scheme that gives him the best chance to succeed. I think when we knew we didn't want to fully bring him in as the starter, I thought it was a big commitment to make for a guy that I wasn't sure was going to be the starter and that's really more what you look at.
"People say, 'Why don't you just do what a guy is good at when he comes in?' Well, the guy is only good if you've been practicing the other 10 guys on offense at that too. That's something that makes it very hard when all your quarterbacks need a little bit different scheme to be successful. It doesn't allow your O-Line to be consistent at what they're working at and things like that.
When we got a chance to get Brain (Hoyer) and then we got Matt (Barkley) and then ended up getting C.J. (Beathard) in the draft and getting Nick (Mullens) in free agency, we've got a skillset of quarterbacks where I think in order to give them a chance to be successful our offense is going to be somewhat similar with all of them and that makes it a little bit easier on the rest of the guys."