San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo was not Tom Brady during this week's minicamp, and news of his mediocre (practice) play is making headlines because ... it's June. While every practice is important, it is crucial to remember that coaches are not only evaluating their players, they are also evaluating plays and tweaks to the playbook. Some of those plays will make it to the regular season; others will not.
While Garoppolo's deep ball continues to be a concern, it probably won't be something he's asked to do more than a handful of times a game once the regular-season kicks off. Garoppolo working on it now while continuing to learn the playbook might not be as big a deal since it is mid-June.
"What I like to see in Jimmy is just go through situations," head coach Kyle Shanahan said this week. "I like seeing him make mistakes. I like seeing him come in (and) work on it. And I like seeing him when we get in that same situation, same coverage, same looks, seeing him correct what he messed up two days ago. He felt the mistake, he understood why it was wrong, and then he wants to correct it himself, not (us saying), 'Hey, that's wrong. Do it this way.' I want him to understand it. Sometimes when things don't work out, you learn."
Garoppolo, who is 7-0 as a starter, has not yet faced adversity. Shanahan knows that day is coming. His quarterback will not remain undefeated forever.
"There's no doubt he's going to face a lot of adversity," Shanahan said in March. "All of the good ones do. Every quarterback in the world does, and it's how you respond to that. Jimmy hasn't had to go through that yet because he hasn't had a lot of playing time.
"Every time he has played, I keep waiting for it to happen and he ends up playing pretty good. I know it's a matter of time, and it will happen. Hopefully, not right away, but I know it will. We'll respond to it, and see how he adjusts, and keep getting better through it."
For now, Garoppolo has handled the little bit of offseason adversity well. After each of this week's two practices, he kept his offensive teammates on the field to put in extra work.
"I think we needed to," Garoppolo said on Wednesday. "I think we had – I don't know how many we had – four or five false starts, or just we didn't all go off at the same time. It's stuff we're working on. That's what practice is for, but we hate to have it happen at all."
Still, Garoppolo completing just eight of his 20 pass attempts at Wednesday's minicamp practice led to the "struggles" headlines like this one from Pro Football Talk. David Lombardi of The Athletic felt it necessary to note that two minicamp practices don't tell the whole offseason picture.
"What this headline doesn't say is that Garoppolo looked sharp throughout most of the offseason program," Lombardi wrote via Twitter.
What this headline doesn't say is that Garoppolo looked sharp throughout most of the offseason program. Not like that matters, anyway, since pads weren't on and teams use the offseason to install specific things — which often leads to "struggles." But context is important https://t.co/0aIneyML8e
— David Lombardi (@LombardiHimself) June 15, 2018
Matt Barrows of the Sacramento Bee discussed Garoppolo during a Friday morning interview on KNBR.
"He did not go 5-0 in the spring season," Barrows said. "He would look really good on some days. Some of his throws, he's able to do that sidearm thing where if there's a pass rusher coming at him, (he) just sort of flips it sidearm and gets it to the guy. Sort of these 'feel' type of things. He's got such a great feel for pressure, a feel for the game. To me, that's what separates good quarterbacks from really, really good quarterbacks.
"I feel like his deep ball was always off this offseason. Even the throws that he was able to connect, it seemed like the receiver would have to come back and sort of out-wrestle the defensive back for it. So, that's an area I think he needs to work on. They're basically working on things that are their weaknesses in practices.
"I think even going back to the Patriots and reading what their reporters wrote over the years, he's a guy that didn't always look good on the practice field, but when it came down to game time, he was very much on the mark."
If Garoppolo's "struggles" vanish in training camp and preseason, then no one will remember what was said in June after a couple of minicamp practices.
