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Kyle Shanahan Still Won't Name the 49ers' Backup Quarterback

Let's help Shanahan make his decision.

Grant Cohn

August 18, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan watches warm ups before the game against the New Orleans Saints at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
August 18, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan watches warm ups before the game against the New Orleans Saints at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports / Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
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The 49ers' backup quarterback competition is over. Now, the team just has to pick a winner.

Joshua Dobbs and Brandon Allen both have had months of OTAs, minicamp, training camp and preseason to prove why they should be Brock Purdy's primary backup. Surely, the 49ers have seen enough.

“No, we haven't decided," head coach Kyle Shanahan said on a conference call this past Sunday. "We haven't told them yet, so still working through that.”

Let's help Shanahan make his decision.

In three preseason games, Brandon Allen completed 19 of 30 pass attempts (63.3%) for 194 yards, 0 touchdowns and 0 interceptions. His quarterback rating was a solid 81.8.

Meanwhile, Joshua Dobbs completed 34 of 51 pass attempts (66.7%) for 351 yards, 1 touchdown and 1 interception. His quarterback rating was 84.7. In addition, he rushed 6 times for 28 yards and 2 touchdowns. So he scored 3 altogether while Allen scored none.

This seems like a no-brainer. Dobbs should be the 49ers' backup quarterback and Allen should be their third-stringer because Dobbs is better than Allen. Sure, Allen knows the offensive system better because he was on the team last year, but Dobbs still outplayed him.

Allen is a smart veteran quarterback who has a strong arm, but he's slow. He can't avoid pressure and he can't improvise. He's a sack waiting to happen. As opposed to Dobbs, who moves quite well and improvises when necessary. Dobbs actually is quite similar to Brock Purdy, while Allen is similar to Jimmy Garoppolo.

Do the right thing, Kyle.

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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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