Jimmy Garoppolo talk is dominating the Bay Area airwaves (or however you listen to radio stations) this morning. The quarterback won his first start with the San Francisco 49ers and is a perfect 3-0 as a starter. Despite the 49ers' deficiencies and failing to get into the end zone, Garoppolo looked like a seasoned veteran and was able to move the offense in the 15-14 victory over the Chicago Bears.
Media personalities are now looking toward the future and wondering what the 49ers will do when it comes to their new quarterback. Garoppolo is in the final year of his contract, and San Francisco has two options. General manager John Lynch and company can either lock him up to a long-term deal or extend the evaluation period by a year with the franchise tag, which will eclipse the $21.3 million value for the quarterback position in 2017.
The 49ers have a healthy surplus in salary cap space so using the franchise tag will not be an issue. However, despite what the team has said in recent weeks, Ian Rapoport of NFL Network believes the 49ers would like to get a long-term deal done. The NFL insider joined KNBR on Monday morning and discussed the 49ers-Garoppolo situation.
"I think you'd like it to be a long-term deal situation," Rapoport said on the "Murph & Mac" show. "Obviously, when you negotiate these deals, the reason why the franchise tag is supposed to exist is basically because it's a placeholder to try to get a long-term deal. So you say, 'We'll lock you in and based around this number, we're going to try to strike a deal.'
"We see it every July 15th when teams have players on the tag and end up doing deals that are basically like the average of the tag over three or four or five years, however much it is. That's like the baseline for a deal.
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"So, the 49ers are generally pretty proactive. I know that Jimmy Garoppolo's agents have done plenty of deals. They've been proactive as well. I think the two sides would probably like to talk early in advanced of the tag and see if you can get something going. Obviously, the Niners would have to make the first move. No player agent is going to make the first move to try to get a deal.
"But I think they would like to get a deal done before the actual franchise tag deadline, but based around what the number would be."
Shanahan has said the 49ers factored in the availability of the franchise tag when the decision to trade for Garoppolo, who had one year left on his deal, was made.
"I think knowing how the franchise tag works and stuff is what made it kind of a no-brainer to make that trade," Shanahan said last week. "Like, 'Hey, you have this opportunity to get such a good player. What's the negative?' Well, you don't want to lose him in six weeks or eight weeks. If you have the franchise tag, then you don't have to ever worry about losing him. You can get there. You can do things the right way, really find out what the guy is. I think we understand that. I think Jimmy understands that also."
Rapoport went on to say that it is more important to find success with Garoppolo than for the team (or the fans) to focus on draft position. Right now, the 49ers are slated to select third overall with the New York Giants leaping ahead of them due to a slightly weaker strength of schedule.
Rapoport points out that the difference between two and three is negligible and cited this past April's draft as an example. The 49ers selected defensive lineman Solomon Thomas third overall. The team was prepared to draft the same player with the second overall pick before the Chicago Bears came asking for a trade.
However, what Rapoport fails to mention is that the trade with Chicago gave the 49ers the flexibility they needed to trade back into the first round and select linebacker Reuben Foster with the 31st overall pick. So in that manner, there was a significant difference between the second and third overall selections.
You can listen to the entire interview with Rapoport below.
