Trey Lance lost the battle for the 49ers' QB2 job to Sam Darnold. Niner Noise looks into the factors that led to Lance's fall from starter to an afterthought.
Rumors began flying last Wednesday that the San Francisco 49ers had made a decision that seemed unthinkable a year ago: Trey Lance, the quarterback they traded up from pick 12 to pick 3 in the 2021 NFL Draft, had lost out to Sam Darnold in the battle to be Brock Purdy's backup this season.
Lance didn't appear at practice on Wednesday either, leading to speculation about the future of the quarterback with the Niners. One thing is for sure, though: He's not the starter or the direct backup, and it feels like the ship has sailed on his time in San Francisco.
Sure, something could still come of this. Maybe the player does some soul-searching and decides that even as the third option, the 49ers are still the best place for him. Or maybe the Niners brass, led by general manager John Lynch and head coach Kyle Shanahan, don't receive a trade offer they like -- something that historically has left them keeping players who are otherwise on the way out -- and Lance has to stay.
Cutting Lance would match up with Shanahan's comments on KNBR yesterday about wanting to "do right for Trey," although the potential hit to San Francisco's already razor-thin salary cap situation might preclude such a move. In that same interview, Shanahan also noted that he'd "feel extremely happy" if Lance is still around when roster cuts are made next week.
But all this leads to one very vital question: How did Lance and the 49ers get here? How did the quarterback go from a guy worth trading up nine slots for to the unquestioned starter in 2022, to possibly being on his way out on the eve of the 2023 campaign?
There were several factors in this, most of them right out in the open, but they're all worth exploring as the Niners try to figure out what to do next with the 23-year-old signal-caller.
Factor No. 1: Trey Lance's injuries
The season-ending ankle and foot injury that Trey Lance sustained in the opening quarter of the 49ers' Week 2 matchup against the Seahawks at Levi's Stadium last season is the obvious place to go first.
But it isn't the only injury that Lance suffered during his first two seasons in San Francisco.
The then-rookie quarterback injured the index finger on his throwing hand during the 2021 preseason finale against the Las Vegas Raiders, and Lance noted during the lead-up to the 2022 season that the injury impacted his ability to throw the ball throughout his rookie year.
Kyle Shanahan said in May of this year that Lance had only just fully recovered from that injury during this offseason, meaning he had multiple things he was recovering from this offseason to prepare for 2023.
The index finger situation likely put him behind the eight-ball in terms of building up his accuracy during his rookie season, and then by the time he was going to be able to show if it had healed enough for him to be successful, he was done for the year after barely five quarters of football last year.
And, as players around the NFL know, when you aren't available, that opens the door for others to step in and take your job, even if the adage is that you can't lose your job due to injury.
That, of course, leads to the second factor that led to Lance's current status with the 49ers: the success of the guys who came in after he got hurt.
Factor No. 2: Brock Purdy's success to end 2023
And yet, for all of the trials that Trey Lance faced with injuries during his first two seasons, none of it might have mattered if the 49ers hadn't had such a good season without him under center.
First it was now-Raiders' quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo stepping back into his old job (after being on the trade block all summer in 2022, and the Niners standing pat when they didn't get offers they liked, which may be a good note to keep in mind over the next few weeks).
Garoppolo was up and down for the first few weeks back in the starting role (solid in relief of Lance in Week 2, a stinker in Denver against the Broncos in Week 3, and an awful game against the Atlanta Falcons in Week 6), but then the 49ers got on a roll and were in the midst of a four-game win streak when he went down with a foot injury of his own in the first quarter of their Week 13 matchup at home versus the Miami Dolphins.
In stepped "Mr. Irrelevant," Brock Purdy, who never looked rattled either during his relief appearance after Garoppolo went down or in leading the 49ers to a 35-7 beatdown of Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in his first NFL start the following week.
In fact, Purdy at times looked like a wilily veteran rather than the rookie that he was, and the Niners wouldn't lose with him at the helm until the ill-fated NFC Championship game versus the Philadelphia Eagles.
If Purdy went out there and was what you'd expect a rookie taken with the final pick in the NFL Draft to be, then it's almost certain that Lance would have been entrenched as the starter just like he was during the offseason last year. Maybe the team still brings in Sam Darnold, but it's probably because they saw enough of Purdy in this alternate universe to come to the exact opposite conclusion they have so far.
That certainly would have changed the trajectory for the team as a whole, who would likely be coming into 2023 with pared-down expectations compared to where they are now, but it also would have meant that Lance would have had another chance to prove he could be the guy the 49ers drafted him to be.
Factor No. 3: Sam Darnold won 49ers' QB2 battle this offseason
There's no telling exactly how this came about, but in the KNBR interview on Wednesday, Kyle Shanahan noted that Sam Darnold won the job starting "about 10 days ago" when "Sam really separated himself" from Trey Lance.
Clearly, a lot of this happened behind close doors during practices, where only Shanahan and the rest of the coaching staff can see who the leader in battles like this are.
This is especially true given how much improved Lance looked in his stint during the 49ers' second preseason game at home against the Broncos. Lance finished the game 12-of-18 for 173 yards with one touchdown and one interception on an extremely athletic play by Bronco's defensive lineman Elijah Garcia, who snatched an attempted screen pass out of the air.
But the most telling thing was that Lance appeared to improve as the game went on, getting more comfortable as he got into rhythm, something that only comes with more reps and opportunties to play.
So maybe that game, along with Darnold simply outperforming Lance during practices, proved to Shanahan something that he likely knew all along: Lance's need for consistency and to get into a rhythm like that meant that if he wasn't going to be the starter then he couldn't be trusted to be the backup.
All these factors came together to lead to Lance to the worst place a player can be: NFL limbo.
Final thoughts
There are a lot of conversations in light of this news about whether the 49ers made the right decisions along the way. About what the team should do now it's clear that Trey Lance is not going to be their quarterback of the future as they thought it would be when they drafted him out of North Dakota State.
Many of those conversations are fair and right. As discussed, the timing has been bad for Lance all along, both in terms of his own play and health and the play of those around him.
But the thinking behind going up to get a quarterback that could potentially elevate San Francisco's roster was not incorrect. That was the difference between the 49ers and the Chiefs when the Niners lost that Super Bowl; the skill position players and the defense were set, the team just needed more at quarterback.
Maybe they took the wrong guy. Or maybe we won't know if he was the wrong guy because the circumstances never fully allowed Lance to show it one way or another.
In either respect, it might be time for some teams to get on the phone and get a better shot at seeing which outcome was correct.
Because Trey Lance isn't going to get that shot with the 49ers.