SF 49ers add former Round 1 QB Josh Rosen to replace Nick Mullens
By Peter Panacy
The SF 49ers lost quarterback Nick Mullens for the rest of 2020, then added a former first-round NFL Draft pick, Josh Rosen, to replace him.
The SF 49ers finally have a first-round quarterback on their 53-man roster.
No, it’s not by the way of the NFL Draft itself. San Francisco still hasn’t drafted a first-round quarterback since selecting Alex Smith back in 2005.
Instead, the Niners plucked the former first-round NFL Draft choice of the Arizona Cardinals back in 2018, quarterback Josh Rosen, off the Tampa Bay Buccaneers practice squad, according to a Tuesday report from ESPN’s Adam Schefter:
49ers are signing QB Josh Rosen off the Buccaneers practice squad on to SF’s active roster, per @FieldYates and me.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) December 22, 2020
The necessity behind the move came after news from head coach Kyle Shanahan on Tuesday the team was going to lose its No. 2 quarterback, Nick Mullens, for the rest of the year after he suffered an elbow injury in San Francisco’s Week 15 loss to the Dallas Cowboys. With starting quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo already shelved on injured reserve with a high-ankle sprain, the only other options the SF 49ers had were C.J. Beathard and the recent practice-squad addition, Josh Johnson.
Things were looking so precarious enough for the Niners, fullback Kyle Juszczyk and running back Jerick McKinnon were being considered emergency quarterbacks.
SF 49ers have a reclamation project in Josh Rosen
Rosen, the highly touted product out of UCLA, hasn’t exactly had a favorable road at the NFL level.
A year after being selected by Arizona, then-first-year head coach Kliff Kingsbury sent him packing to the Miami Dolphins after the Cardinals elected to go with quarterback Kyler Murray first overall in the 2019 NFL Draft. Rosen’s new team didn’t exactly give him much by the way of long-term protection, drafting former Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa in Round 1 the following year.
Just like that, Rosen was on the move again and eventually landed on Tampa Bay’s practice squad.
| Year | Age | Tm | G | GS | QBrec | Cmp | Att | Cmp% | Yds | TD | Int | 1D | Y/A | Y/G | Rate | Sk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 21 | ARI | 14 | 13 | 3-10-0 | 217 | 393 | 55.2 | 2278 | 11 | 14 | 112 | 5.8 | 162.7 | 66.7 | 45 |
| 2019 | 22 | MIA | 6 | 3 | 0-3-0 | 58 | 109 | 53.2 | 567 | 1 | 5 | 26 | 5.2 | 94.5 | 52.0 | 16 |
| Care | Care | 20 | 16 | 3-13-0 | 275 | 502 | 54.8 | 2845 | 12 | 19 | 138 | 5.7 | 142.3 | 63.5 | 61 | |
| 1 yr | 1 yr | ARI | 14 | 13 | 3-10-0 | 217 | 393 | 55.2 | 2278 | 11 | 14 | 112 | 5.8 | 162.7 | 66.7 | 45 |
| 1 yr | 1 yr | MIA | 6 | 3 | 0-3-0 | 58 | 109 | 53.2 | 567 | 1 | 5 | 26 | 5.2 | 94.5 | 52.0 | 16 |
Provided by Pro-Football-Reference.com
Generated 12/22/2020.
Rosen is already considered damaged goods, and it will be hard for him to ever shake the “bust” moniker associated with him only three years into his pro career.
But like Smith, whose early NFL start wasn’t exactly pretty and followed a difficult path, there’s always the chance Rosen could wind up turning things around under Shanahan and with an offense built to win now.
Or at least in 2021 when it’s much healthier.
San Francisco’s quarterback room could look drastically different next season. Mullens and Beathard are both pending free agents, the latter being of the unrestricted variety. There’s also no shortage of speculation the SF 49ers could move on from Garoppolo this offseason, too, both to free up salary cap space and to land someone who might be a more potent fit in Shanahan’s system.
It’s a tall order to think Rosen would fit into the latter category, and it’s possible he’s merely a holdover option so the Niners don’t have to worry about fielding Juszczyk or McKinnon as actual on-field signal-callers.
Next. 5 things that frighten 49ers fans the most. dark
Still, there’s no chance without possibility, and that’s exactly what Rosen and San Francisco have right now.