Having been given the opportunity to start, quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo was excited to head to the San Francisco 49ers. "Euphoric" might be a better word to describe Garoppolo's feelings on being traded from the New England Patriots, especially if you ask Peter King of The MMQB.
King appeared on the Rich Eisen Show and shared what it meant to Garoppolo to join the 49ers and not some other team.
"Jimmy Garoppolo was, to put it mildly, euphoric at getting traded to San Francisco," King told Eisen. "I don't think he might have said all the right things if he got traded to Cleveland but he would not have been euphoric. He was euphoric going because he knows that Kyle Shanahan had the seventh-best offense in NFL history last year in Atlanta, that they have a six-year contract, he and John Lynch, that there's a history there, and they've got some really good building blocks on defense. And he thinks if you got to go to a bad team, that's the best bad team you could go to."
That certainly makes a lot of sense. The Cleveland Browns have gone through five starting quarterbacks in just the last two seasons under head coach Hue Jackson. As an organization, the Browns have had 28 starting quarterbacks since the franchise returned to the NFL in 1999. Many believe Jackson is on the hot seat in Cleveland after winning just one game over the last two seasons. The stability certainly isn't there.
"Stable" has not been a word to describe the 49ers organization in recent years, either. In February, Shanahan became the franchise's fourth head coach in as many years. However, he and Lynch are well-respected around the NFL and are armed with six-year contracts to rebuild the once proud franchise at a pace they feel is best for the future of the organization.
On Thursday morning, Adam Schefter of ESPN told KNBR that the respect Bill Belichick has for Shanahan and Lynch was likely one of the contributing factors for the trade.
"I think a lot of this also, some part of this, had to do with the fact that Bill Belichick has as much respect as he does for John Lynch and Kyle Shanahan," Schefter said. "And when he looked at it, he could have traded Jimmy Garoppolo anywhere. Cleveland was dying for Jimmy Garoppolo. He decided that he wanted to send him out of conference to an organization he trusted. I know people would be skeptical of that, but I think he believes in these guys and that they're going to do right by Jimmy Garoppolo and this will be a great environment to groom him, grow him, and have him learn."
What were Garoppolo's first thoughts when he heard the 49ers had traded for him?
"Just the rich history," the quarterback said on KNBR earlier this week. "I was excited to get here. I mean, get on a plane and everything -- I couldn't wait for it. Hopefully, good things will come."
