ESPN senior insider John Clayton gave his thoughts on KBR 1050’s The Audible this morning regarding the 49ers’s potential quest for a quarterback in the draft.
Clayton delivered some bad news.
The market has cooled considerably amongst college quarterbacks expected to declare in 2017. Many do not see Clemson’s Deshaun Watson, Notre Dame’s DeShone Kizer or UNC’s Mitch Trubisky as top five draft picks, or even franchise quarterbacks to build around.
“Where are you going to get the quarterback next year? Because when you start looking at the landscape, what was considered a good quarterback draft is no longer a good quarterback draft,” Clayton said. “Clearly the quarterback situation is going to be blown up…There’s no chance Colin Kaepernick will be back.”
Without mentioning Trent Baalke by name, Clayton said not much of the 2016 fiasco can be placed on head coach Chip Kelly.
“You figure there’s going to be some type of a change and I don’t think it’s going to be the coach in Chip Kelly,” Clayton said. “Certainly the pressure is going to be on to make a decision. I still think for talent, it’s more of a next year team, but you could see that problems (were coming) this year, then a few injuries made it worse. At the moment, Chip is working without wide receivers, he’s got problems there.”
It is clear that Jed York’s decision will have a lasting impact on this team’s future.