Three reasons Colin Kaepernick can save the 49ers
Colin Kaepernick is the San Francisco 49ers starting quarterback once again and here is why he is the answer to the team’s issues at quarterback this year.
It’s unprecedented for an NFL quarterback to appear on the cover of TIME before starting an NFL game. But such has been Colin Kaepernick’s 2016. Kaepernick, as is now almost universal knowledge, began kneeling during the national anthem during the preseason in protest of social injustice throughout America. The movement is now bigger than Kaepernick, and Kaepernick’s role in a 49ers jersey is about to change drastically.
It was announced early Tuesday afternoon that Kaepernick will reclaim the throne from Blaine Gabbert as starting quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers. Kaepernick will make his first start of 2016 on Sunday against the Buffalo Bills.
How will this move impact the 49ers season moving forward? Is Kaepernick the savior that they’ve avoided all along?
3. Kaepernick has been here before
Remember the first time Kaepernick took over the 49ers starting quarterback position mid-season? In November 2012, the end of the Alex Smith era in San Francisco began and a young man named Colin Kaepernick came out of nowhere to dazzle. He led San Francisco to Super Bowl XLVII, where they lost to Baltimore. Kaepernick set the league on fire and proved to be a prototype that the game hadn’t really seen.
But the point remains that Kaepernick came in and never looked back. Well, that season anyway. It’s been steady dwindling since 2013 (he led the 49ers to a 12-4 season in 2013) for Kaepernick, even though his career record as a starter is 27-20.
That said: the flip side, of course, is that Kaepernick has been here before but couldn’t maintain the level he began his career at or stick as a starting quarterback in the NFL. Do we simply know what the ceiling is for Kaepernick and that it’s average?
The fact remains that Blaine Gabbert has started over Kaepernick for five weeks this season. Regardless of what you think of Chip Kelly as an NFL head coach, you have to assume that there is a legitimate football reason Gabbert beat out Kaepernick until now.