San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo is 22-5 as a starter, including this past Saturday's playoff win over the Minnesota Vikings. He passed for 3,978 yards with 27 touchdowns and 13 interceptions during the regular season and now ranks fourth in single-season passing yards in franchise history.
Yet, Garoppolo still has his critics. There are still many waiting for the 49ers quarterback to prove he is good. He's won 22 of his 27 starts, and 20 of 25 as the starter with San Francisco. What more does he need to do?
Colin Cowherd of Fox Sports Radio and Fox Sports 1 think he knows why the public perception of Garoppolo is so unfairly skewed and shared his thoughts this week. He believes fantasy football has a lot to do with it.
If you are looking for Garoppolo to put up 400 yards and four touchdowns a game, he's probably not your guy. If you want a quarterback to lead you to 13 regular-season wins, get you to the NFC Championship, and help you to possibly compete for a championship, Garoppolo is your guy.
You can listen to Cowherd's comments below. Hat tip to Zain Naqvi for the find.
"Remember when 21-5 as a starter was good enough? What more do you want from Jimmy Garoppolo?" — @ColinCowherd pic.twitter.com/Bylr132kt0
— Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@TheHerd) January 16, 2020
Head coach Kyle Shanahan was asked this week about the perception of Garoppolo and why the quarterback doesn't get more credit for the team's success.
"That's just how this world works," Shanahan responded, "and you'll get credit if you win a Super Bowl or an NFL MVP or something like that. We ran the ball last week, so a lot of people are going to say that Jimmy didn't do enough. There's lots of games this year that we haven't been able to run the ball, and we've had to win it by passing.
"That's what I'm proud of with Jimmy and proud of our team, that you can't really say that we have to win a game a certain way. I think we've shown that we can win a number of ways, which shows a lot to our players."