Jimmy Garoppolo Spent 15 Hours Per Week With Mike Shanahan After ACL Tear

Garoppolo started just three games in 2018 before tearing his ACL against the Chiefs on Sept. 23.

49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo's season was cut short in 2018 after tearing his ACL in Week 3, but Garoppolo still got plenty of face time with Mike Shanahan, the father of 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan, according to The MMQB's Albert Breer. 

Garoppolo reportedly spent Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays with Shanahan in 2018, spending four to five hours per day with the former Broncos head coach rather than sit-in on team meetings and practices. Mike Shanahan lived with his son for three months in the Bay Area, coming into the 49ers facility each day to work with the team's franchise QB.

"As a quarterback, you always want to know the why, because if someone comes up to you and asks a question, you want to be able to answer it,” Garoppolo told Breer. “So there’s certain things, when I got traded here, they were just telling me, ‘Learn this play, you don’t need to know the whole play, just this part of it.’ And then after that was over, you get more time to break it down and everything, and Mike did a phenomenal job with that.”

Shanahan was happy with the duo's progress throughout the 2018 season.

"This was time well-spent. We’d go back through 10 years of film that’s pertinent to that particular play or that coverage he’s facing," Shanahan said. "And when he’s not in a hurry to learn, it’s a little more fun than in the season, when he’s getting ready to play. He could relax. And I hope in time, because of it, things will start to slow down for him, he’ll be more, comfortable with the terminology, getting used to plays, the audibles, and so forth."

Garoppolo was traded from the Patriots to San Francisco in October 2017. He signed a five-year, $137.5 million extension in February 2018.

The Eastern Illinois product is 8–2 in his career as a starter, including a 5–0 stretch in 2017. Garoppolo has thrown 17 touchdowns and eight interceptions in his career.