SF 49ers: What if Patriots never traded Jimmy Garoppolo

Domino No. 3: The 2018 and 2019 SF 49ers

There are two elements to this domino and how it falls.

First, with Jimmy Garoppolo in New England and, for the purposes of this exercise, Kirk Cousins a 49er, there’s a pretty decent chance the 2018 version of the Niners with Cousins is not bottom-of-the-league bad.

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This means they don’t hold the No.2 overall pick in the 2019 NFL Draft.

This means they almost certainly don’t land former Ohio State EDGE Nick Bosa to add to an already strong defensive line.

Not having Bosa would be a major blow to the 2019 SF 49ers defense, which rode the success of the pass rush to go from the second-worst team in 2018 to the NFC Champions the following season.

And as much maligned as Jimmy Garoppolo was at times during the 49ers Super Bowl run in 2019, it’s hard to believe Kirk Cousins would have been an upgrade, especially since Garoppolo and the Niners exposed the Vikings defense and Cousins himself in the NFC divisional playoff game that season.

That may have spelled a less than successful 2019 season that didn’t end in the Super Bowl, albeit in a losing fashion.

All of this to say: no matter how SF 49ers fans may feel about Jimmy Garoppolo at this point in the 2020 season or even about his long-term future as a member of the Niners, it feels like the trade was the best-case scenario for all parties involved.