The San Francisco 49ers added veteran quarterback Tom Savage to the active roster on Tuesday. It's the first time during the Kyle Shanahan era that the team heads into a regular-season game with three quarterbacks on the 53-man roster.
One thing has been made clear: C.J. Beathard is the starting quarterback moving forward. Savage was not brought in to compete for that job. He also wasn't brought in to fight for the backup quarterback job. That spot belongs to the team's other second-year quarterback, Nick Mullens.
Savage is the 49ers' emergency quarterback, and that is where he is likely to remain. That means he will be handling the scout-team duties during practices. Savage has appeared in 13 NFL games over his three NFL seasons. However, he has one more start than Beathard while Mullens has never appeared in a game.
With Savage having much more experience than Mullens, head coach Kyle Shanahan was asked on Wednesday afternoon why there isn't going to be a battle for the backup quarterback job.
"It's very hard for someone to compete for the backup spot," Shanahan told reporters. "The only reps the backup spot gets in the NFL is the scout-team cards. So we'll give him some scout-team cards to let him get some work and stuff but in order to have the guys compete to be a backup player, that means I'd have to give both of them reps over our starting quarterback (Beathard), and that's not something anyone would ever do at this time of the year."
With Savage having more experience than Mullens, at least one member of the media questioned the decision not to at least give Savage the opportunity. Would Savage provide the 49ers with a better chance should something happen to Beathard?
"I'm sure it does seem (like that) on the surface, but one guy knows our offense, and knows how to line people up, and has played in it, done a lot of good things, and our team has confidence in him," Shanahan responded. "Another guy just got here last night and is just trying to learn what the words mean. He has ability. He's a guy that I've always been impressed with his ability but he just got here and by no means are we trying to have a number two quarterback competition battle right now. We're trying to get our starters ready to play, continue to prepare our backup in case something does happen. If that does ever happen, we'll deal with it then."