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Where 49ers QB Brock Purdy Ranks Among NFL Players 25 and Younger

Brock Purdy is one of the best young players in the NFL.
Grant Cohn|
Dec 30, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy (13) before the game against the Detroit Lions at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images
Dec 30, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy (13) before the game against the Detroit Lions at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images | Sergio Estrada-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

Brock Purdy is one of the best young players in the NFL.

At just 25 years old, he already has gone to two NFC Championship Games and a Super Bowl. And while he had a down season last year, the 49ers just gave him a five-year, $265 million extension, so he's their franchise quarterback.

Still, his stock took a bit of a hit the past 12 months. Last year, he was CBS Sports' 10th-best player 25 or younger. This year, he ranks 14th.

"Did he finally stumble under the weight of a battered 49ers supporting cast in 2024? Yes," writes CBS Sports' Cody Benjamin. "Does that fully erase the poise, play-extending shiftiness and highly efficient point-guarding that made him Kyle Shanahan's best Super Bowl-caliber starter to date? Not in our eyes. Purdy's vision and composure are still borderline elite."

It's interesting that most people view 2024 as a one-off for Purdy and assume he'll bounce back to the player he was in 2023. But in each of his three seasons in the NFL, his interception percentage has gone up and his touchdown percentage has gone down. Meanwhile, he got injured twice last season and has a surgically-repaired throwing elbow. So it's unclear how bright his future truly is.

If Purdy has another inconsistent season, it will be interesting to see how the perception of him changes now that he's the seventh-highest-paid player in the NFL. Critics might not be so patient and understanding with him this season.

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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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