Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
Matt Maiocco of
CSN Bay Area joined Chad, Jo & Lo on
95.7 The Game Wednesday morning to talk about ... the heat at Levi's Stadium? The segment started out on that topic as Maiocco expressed confusion on why the heat at the San Francisco 49ers' home is such an issue with fans when there are certainly other NFL stadiums that have it worse.
Colin Kaepernick
Stadium issues aside, Maiocco did go on to talk about the team itself, starting with the 49ers' quarterback situation. He started by discussing
Colin Kaepernick, who was cleared by his doctors yesterday.
"So the issues that were holding him up – he had the shoulder surgery in late-November," said Maiocco. "Then after the season was over, in early January, he had procedures on his thumb and also on his knee. So basically, the shoulder injury kept him from doing the kind of weight training that he typically does in the offseason. As a result, you could noticeably tell that he was a lot more thin than he had been since really he came into the NFL. So he had to work through the surgery to repair that torn labrum in his left shoulder and the rehab and everything else.
"So late in the offseason program, he was cleared to take part in all of the individual stuff, the 7-on-7. Basically cleared to resume all football activity. The 49ers held him out of most of the 11-on-11 stuff, but it was pretty much a foregone conclusion at that point that he would be ready to go for training camp. Now, in his mind, when they broke for the offseason program, he stuck around and continued to workout and rehab in Santa Clara. His goal was to put on the weight, get all the strength back, get his weight back to where he wanted it to be.
"What's interesting is that in his previous NFL offseasons, he spent a lot of time working on – y'know, getting stronger, getting bigger, faster, stronger and some people thought that was kind of counterproductive to playing the position of quarterback in the NFL. Certainly, it is never a bad thing to be strong, but could you be too strong? And I asked him that when they broke and he said, 'Not too strong,' but he felt that maybe he was too tight. He didn't have maybe the fluid movements in the upper body that he would like to have so that's the Colin Kaepernick that he wants to see from himself and the 49ers expect to see when he shows up on the field Sunday for the first practice. And he will have a legitimate chance to compete."
Trent Baalke's future
On Tuesday, former 49ers director of player personnel
Vinny Cerrato was on the show and discussed the idea that general manager
Trent Baalke should "keep his head on a swivel" and be worried about his job. Maiocco as asked if he feels the same way.
"A little bit," answered Maiocco. "I think the performance of this team – the performances of the young players – in a lot of ways will dictate what happens with Trent Baalke. If at the end of this season – if Jed York and whomever else might be making decisions ... probably
Chip Kelly has to be involved in this ... if at the end of the season, they look at it and say, 'Wow, we're not where we want to be and the pieces aren't even in place for us to get where we want to be,' then I think
Jed York would have to consider making a change. And it's pretty clear that the signal has been sent that
Tom Gamble, who is a known ally of Chip Kelly – in fact, Gamble was the only ally in that Philadelphia Eagles building that Chip Kelly had ... they parted ways with him ... fired him late in that 2014 season – that would be the natural progression.
"If they come to the conclusion that Trent Baalke's systematic approach to putting together a roster just simply is not working and will not work because the pieces aren't there, then I think that Chip Kelly, who would be, at that point, one year into his four-year contract with the 49ers, I would think that the person that he would be most comfortable with filling the roster that he's going to put out on the field on Sundays would be exactly that man – Tom Gamble."
You can listen to the entire interview
here on 95.7 The Game.
Arik Armstead is looking forward to the upcoming season. There is a lot to look forward to. His San Francisco 49ers have been to the NFC Championship Game three times over the past four seasons. They once again have a competitive roster and look to make another run at a Super Bowl championship.
Armstead joined Adam Schefter on the ESPN insider's podcast, discussing several 49ers-related topics.
New defensive coordinator Steve Wilks
Steve Wilks replaces DeMeco Ryans as defensive coordinator. Armstead had nothing but praise for his former coordinator, who left to be the Houston Texans' head coach, but looks forward to working with Wilks.
Wilks isn't expected to make any drastic changes in his first season helming the 49ers defense.
Ranking season has kicked off over at Pro Football Focus. Brock Purdy recently came in at No. 23 in the analytics site's ranking of NFL quarterbacks. Now, Pro Football Focus has turned its attention to offensive tackles. While there are some question marks along the San Francisco 49ers' offensive line, left tackle is not one of them.
Trent Williams has earned a grade of 91.9 or higher in each of his three seasons with the 49ers, including a career-high and Pro Football Focus all-time best mark of 97.8 in 2021. The 34-year-old has been the highest-graded tackle in each season
One of the biggest criticisms about Jimmy Garoppolo has been his availability. The quarterback wins football games but has been available for an entire season just once in his career—in 2019.
Garoppolo's latest injury occurred on December 4 while with the San Francisco 49ers. The veteran left a regular-season game against the Miami Dolphins with a foot injury. It was later revealed that he suffered a broken foot and would miss significant time. However, it wasn't believed to require surgery.
That led to the emergence of Brock Purdy, the seventh-round draft pick that took the NFL by storm. He led the 49ers to the NFC Championship Game before suffering an injury himself.
Garoppolo remained on the 49ers' 53-man roster through all that. The 49ers
Sometimes who is teaching is as important as what is being taught
Earlier this week, when the San Francisco 49ers opened up an OTAs session to the media, most of the eyes, in person and online, were on third-year quarterback Trey Lance's new delivery. Lance, of course, had been working with QB guru, Jeff Christensen, and thanks to some leaked footage of Lance throwing with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, along with a very well-timed piece by Matt Barrows in The Athletic, there was plenty of