A significant part of Jimmy Garoppolo's return to the football field, aside from monitoring the condition of his knee, has been building chemistry with the San Francisco 49ers' young wide receiver core. The quarterback has played with some of the players in that group, like Marquise Goodwin and Trent Taylor. Garoppolo also briefly had opportunities last year to connect with then-rookie Dante Pettis before the quarterback's season-ending ACL injury.
The 49ers added two wide receivers via the draft this year, and there are two other rookies within the group. That means several new faces with which to build chemistry.
Garoppolo joined KNBR on Thursday morning and discussed the talented but mostly inexperienced wide receivers on the roster.
"The competition in that room is high right now," Garoppolo said. "There's a lot of talent, a lot of guys fighting for positions. That's a good thing, though. On a football team, that's going to lead to better football and a better football team in the long run.
"When you have that competition, it pushes everyone. Guys are stepping up. The young guys, they're coming along, learning as quickly as possible. This isn't the easiest offense in the world, obviously, but these guys, they're coming along well."
And what of rookie receivers Deebo Samuel and Jalen Hurd? Can they be expected to make an immediate impact or is the learning curve too steep?
"It's up to them," Garoppolo responded. "It's how quickly can they process all the information and transfer it out to the field. It's difficult for a rookie, but those guys, they've been impressive so far."
General manager John Lynch spoke on KNBR before Garoppolo and discussed the quarterback's recovery from his torn ACL suffered on September 23, 2018.
"He's had a flawless recovery," Lynch said. "Throughout the offseason, we didn't put him out there. He wasn't cleared to play anything other than 7-on-7, and that's really not football. So we took the next step come training camp, and it's been 11-on-11.
"His recovery, knock on wood, has been somewhat flawless. He's been able to just go play. We haven't had to limit or monitor his reps. He's doing a really nice job, and they're pushing him hard."
Garoppolo is grateful for the "flawless recovery" from his devastating injury. Although, he, like Lynch, is also knocking on wood. After all, a setback-free rehab isn't always the case.
"We haven't had any setbacks, which is always what you hope for," Garoppolo said. "You always hear these horror stories of guys who get unfortunate accidents and things like that, and, knock on wood, we haven't had any of that yet."
You can listen to the entire conversation with Garoppolo below.