Jimmy Garoppolo Out Indefinitely

Jimmy Garoppolo may have played his final game with the 49ers.

Jimmy Garoppolo may have played his final game with the 49ers.

Garoppolo is out indefinitely with a high-ankle sprain he suffered Week 2 against the New York Jets, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter. Meaning we might not see Garoppolo for the rest of the season. After he injured his ankle initially, he missed the 49ers next two games, but returned Week 6 against the Miami Dolphins and hasn’t appeared on the 49ers’ injury report the past two weeks.

When asked recently about Garoppolo’s ankle injury, Kyle Shanahan had said it’s fine, while Garoppolo has said it still bothers him. And when he’s on the field, it’s clear it still bothers him. He throws a football like he expects to feel excruciating pain in his right foot when he plants and drives off it.

So he doesn’t plant or drive. He stands flatfooted in the pocket like a statue and flings dead ducks off his back foot. His footwork is so bad, he has lost the ability to throw a spiral consistently, and every throw that travels past the line of scrimmage is an adventure. His wide receivers, Brandon Aiyuk and Deebo Samuel, both seem frustrated when they run downfield, get open and Garoppolo never even looks at them.

You wonder if Garoppolo’s teammates have started to lose confidence in him, or if they sympathize with his pain.

Either way, it seems likely the 49ers will release or trade Garoppolo this offseason -- he’s so expensive and brittle, and the salary cap will go down in 2021. So it might help the 49ers to play Nick Mullens the rest of the season, so they know just how good he is and if he can be the veteran starter while a rookie develops or if the 49ers need to sign some other veteran starter.

And if Mullens plays well, I doubt we’ll see Garoppolo play another game for the 49ers.