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Kyle Shanahan Says Trey Lance is Ready to Start But Won't Name Him the Starter Yet

Shanahan said Lance "can be a starter," then walked back his statement and reiterated general manager John Lynch, who said Monday that the 49ers will not release Jimmy Garoppolo.

Grant Cohn

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Finally, a public vote of confidence for Trey Lance from someone important in the 49ers organization.

"That's why we looked into trading Jimmy Garoppolo," head coach Kyle Shanahan said Tuesday at the NFL's owners' meetings, "because we obviously believe that Trey Lance can be a starter and we're ready to do that."

Sounds great! Although technically, Shanahan stopped short of actually naming Lance the starter. Shanahan said Lance "can be a starter." Big difference.

Then Shanahan walked back his statement and reiterated general manager John Lynch, who said Monday that the 49ers will not release Jimmy Garoppolo.

"We're not just going to get rid of a good quarterback because we have other quarterbacks on the roster," Shahanahan said. "Quarterbacks are really hard to come by. Some teams don't have any at all. The fact that we have three we're happy with, that is a good thing. You always want to upgrade your team. Usually, only one guy can play. We know all our guys are capable of starting. Jimmy has done a great job for us. We brought Trey here to be that eventually, and I think that will be sooner than later."

Again, vague. What is sooner than later? Is that Week 1? Week 10? 2023? I guess we'll find out if the 49ers never find a trade partner for him.

One thing looks certain -- Garoppolo will be on the team when training camp starts. And Shanahan indicated the 49ers will have a quarterback competition."

"Jimmy's a good quarterback," Shanahan said. "He's not easy for anyone to beat out. Trey wasn't ready to beat him out last year. He'll be definitely closer to that this year if it happens, but it's something we won't have to worry about until training camp. Usually when you have a situation like that, it makes everyone better anyway."

Sounds like the 49ers are hedging their bets in case Lance doesn't live up their expectations.

Stay tuned.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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