Ace up their sleeve: How the San Francisco 49ers landed North Dakota State’s Trey Lance
Maybe the 49ers were masters of deception, or maybe they just let the Mac Jones rumors spread unencumbered as they sat back and watched the media run rampant with speculation.
Either way, few people saw Thursday night’s Trey Lance pick coming. In fact, Lance had been the guy head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch targeted all along after they made their internal quarterback evaluations in January, long before trading a package including three first-round picks to the Miami Dolphins for No. 3 March 26..
“We have been very high on Trey since the beginning, since day one,” Shanahan said Monday. “Yes, the person everyone else is speculating about (Jones), we liked him too, but it was just honestly to go through this whole process where no one has known, my friends, coaches, anybody, how John and I feel and how we felt this whole time.”
The pick came four days after an awkward and defensive news conference, where Shanahan and Lynch dealt with pre-draft questions about looming negative fan reaction to Jones. After all, Shanahan has a reputation for immobile pocket passers that would serve as an avatar for Shanahan on the sideline. The feeling throughout the process was Shanahan just wanted a quarterback that could run his system to perfection and not deviate, with Jones drawing comparisons to former Shanahan quarterbacks like Matt Ryan and Kirk Cousins.
“We thought that could be an advantage for us,” Shanahan said of the misdirection. “If the whole NFL is assuming, you’re doing one thing and you’re not doing that, I’m not going to work hard to correct that. So, let that be. And whatever way that went it was going to go and it was crazy to watch where it all went. But no one has known anything but us.”
Shanahan bucked the trend associated with what he’s liked in the past, taking a big, mobile, strong-armed quarterback with immense upside. Lance has a similar athletic skill set to some of the league’s best quarterbacks, and Shanahan clearly hopes Lance can develop into a quarterback that could compete with Patrick Mahomes, Russell Wilson, Aaron Rodgers, Kyler Murray, and the recent addition to the NFC West, Matthew Stafford.
Investing three first-round picks is a lot. But if Lance develops into a star-level player, no price is too high. And presumably the 49ers’ championship window could remain open as long as Lance is the starter. He’ll turn 21 May 9.
“I’m sure glad that it’s over. I’m glad we got our guy. I’m glad we feel so good about it and I’m just pumped to get him here,” Shanahan said.
What Shanahan likes about Lance
Lance is nearly 6-foot-4 and 225 pounds. He has one of the stronger arms in the draft class and unique athleticism for the position. He likely won’t be Lamar Jackson as a runner, but he has a chance to be one of the NFL’s best rushers at the position.
He only played in 17 games in college and they came at the FCS-level North Dakota State. He helped the Bison go 16-0 during his redshirt freshman season while leading them to a national championship. He set an NCAA record with 287 attempts with no interceptions, though the offense didn’t ask him to throw all that much. He averaged just 18 pass attempts per game, but a robust 9.7 yards per attempt thanks to his 67 percent completion rate.
He had 1,100 rushing yards and 14 rushing touchdowns, along with his 28 passing touchdowns. Lance could give the 49ers an awfully potent weapon in the red zone and in short-yardage situations.
So what did Shanahan like about his new investment?
“I could talk about that for a while because it goes into so many different areas,” he said. “But it always starts with me with the film. I tried to watch the guy how he played the quarterback position, how he executes his own offense. Just kind of the natural feeling he has for the quarterback position. That part entails getting the ball to the right spots, you try to figure out what plays they’re doing and does the ball go to where it should go to. When nothing is there, how quick are they to recognize and make it off schedule or to get rid of it or just not take a sack and don’t make it worse.”
Shanahan earlier this week was asked about the trend of mobile quarterbacks in the league versus the tradition “pocket passers” which could also be a misnomer for less athletic quarterbacks. Lance is obviously in line with the trend of mobile throwers who can make plays outside the structure of the offense and be put on the move in Shanahan’s play-action heavy passing attack.
“You start to watch some of that stuff with him and I just loved his natural ability to play the position, which was very impressive,” Shanahan said. “Then when you add on a type of running element, which I’ve always been intrigued with, but when you’ve got a guy who has got the skill set as far as speed and size to where you’re not going to make him a runner, but you can get in certain formations where the defense knows you will run him if they don’t honor him, now everything is different. And if you can ever get a guy like that and make 11-on-11 football then I think you have got a guy who can change some things for you.”
The knock on Lance had been his accuracy. It’s a trait that isn’t often improved on in the NFL, but his 67 percent completion rate and no interceptions as a 19-year-old offer a good starting point. His competition level will change drastically once he gets in the NFL. But so will his supporting cast, which will include one of the league’s best tight ends in George Kittle and a promising duo of receivers in Brandon Aiyuk and Deebo Samuel.
Shanahan was asked about accuracy and how much he can help as a coach. Lance has been compared to Buffalo’s Josh Allen, who was the least accurate quarterback in the league during his first two seasons. But Allen was the rare quarterback to improve in that area. His completion rate jumped from 58.8% to 69.2% between years two and three. Perhaps Lance could clean up his mechanics and be as accurate as Shanahan needs.
“I think accuracy’s going to come down to the person,” Shanahan said. “I always try to help people with accuracy by getting their feet in the right spots, and doing things like that. I’m never going to sit there and demonstrate and pretend to tell them exactly how he needs to throw it. I try to get his feet in the right spot, his eyes in the right spot, because I think if you’re in a balanced position, and you’re in the club as an NFL thrower, you will be. If things get off and your feet aren’t under you, your accuracy’s going to follow.”
What about Jimmy Garoppolo?
Shanahan didn’t do current starting quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo any favors Monday when he said he couldn’t guarantee any of us will be alive to see Sunday, let alone remain on the roster of his football team. He admitted that error Thursday, noting he was trying to joke with a reporter but it didn’t hit as intended.
“I hated how that came off. I talked to Jimmy about it right away. I even realized it when I did it,” Shanahan said.
After Monday, it sounded like Garoppolo had no future with the 49ers. And if the pick was Jones, as many assumed (ahem!), Shanahan would make him the starter and ship Garoppolo elsewhere.
That’s less clear with Lance now given he only played in one game in 2020 due to the pandemic. Shanahan said he’d like to see Lance on the practice field to determine if he’s able to compete for the starting job (it’s unclear if there will be an on-field portion of OTAs over the next two months).
If not, Shanahan remains confident Garoppolo can keep San Francisco competitive, which sets up for an ideal scenario of having a starter and a future quarterback in the wings to develop.
“Jimmy’s situation is, if he isn’t here on Sunday, I would be disappointed,” Shanahan said, while not entirely closing the door on a potential trade, though one seems unlikely. “We made this move, it’s obvious what I hope and what I believe in with this guy coming in, but it would be a very tough situation if Jimmy’s not on our team. I want Jimmy to be here, and I want this kid brought along. I want to see how he does, and if it turns into a competition, it turns into a competition.”
Which brings back the idea Shanahan brought up initially when the team made the trade, calling the Patrick Mahomes and Alex Smith dynamic from 2017 an favorable scenario for developing a young quarterback.
Although if the right trade package is offered for Garoppolo, things could change. The Patriots and Bears were two teams that may have been in the mix, but they each landed quarterbacks in the first round. Chicago traded up to take Ohio State’s Justin Fields at pick No. 11 while Jones lasted all the way to New England at No. 15.
Aaron Rodgers, other odds and ends
A wild report came to light Thursday afternoon hours before the draft began. According to ESPN, Aaron Rodgers told the Green Bay Packers he wants to leave the organization, and according to Pro Football Talk, one of Rodgers’ preferred destinations was the 49ers.
Lynch said he was unaware Rodgers would be available, and he made a call to the Packers to check.
“Yeah, we inquired,” Lynch said. “It was a quick into the conversation it wasn’t happening. As we said, we have been convicted and excited for a long, long time so we went right back to where we’ve been and that’s really excited about adding Trey Lance to the 49ers and we’re thrilled about that.”
Rodgers’ future remains very much in the air. There have been reports about trade talks with the Denver Broncos, who used the No. 9 overall pick Thursday on Alabama cornerback Patrick Surtain. Rodgers is also reportedly interested in joining the Las Vegas Raiders. That’s a story to keep an eye on, but it doesn’t appear Rodgers is coming to the team that passed on him in the 2005 draft.
▪ Lance received positive marks from talent evaluators regarding his personality, character and leadership traits. Those things jumped out to Shanahan and Lynch. Shanahan said he thought Lance conducted himself like a CEO.
“I think the biggest thing for me is just earning that mutual love and respect,” Lance said. “And that’s earned, especially as a quarterback, obviously, you have to make sacrifices. And this is what I signed up for. And this is what I love to do. And I can’t wait to do it.”
Shanahan was unable to have much in-person time with Lance. There interactions were limited to Zoom calls and the second pro day at North Dakota State earlier this month.
“I could say a lot of stuff to him,” Shanahan said. “I could be very upfront with him and I got to know him and he’s a guy that I think is a very good person, comes from a very good family. He’s very impressive in terms of his intellect, how he deals with people, how he handles a social situation. I looked at him as the CEO of a company, if I ever knew anything about that stuff. So, you put that to the side and it’s a hell of a quarterback and this is someone I believe in and I want to go to work with.”
This story was originally published April 30, 2021 at 7:04 AM.
