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George Kittle Says Brock Purdy is Worth the Money the 49ers Pay Him

Purdy is doing well. Unfortunately, he's not doing much better than his predecessor, Jimmy Garoppolo, despite being a better quarterback than him.
Grant Cohn|
Dec 17, 2023; Glendale, Arizona, USA; San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle (85) with quarterback Brock Purdy (13) against the Arizona Cardinals at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
Dec 17, 2023; Glendale, Arizona, USA; San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle (85) with quarterback Brock Purdy (13) against the Arizona Cardinals at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports | Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

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San Francisco 49ers

When the 49ers gave Brock Purdy a five-year, $265 million contract extension this offseason, some people scoffed at the deal.

That's $53 million per season on average for a quarterback who doesn't carry his offense. He's not even a top-five player on his own team. And he's coming off a down season in which he missed the playoffs and the Pro Bowl.

On top of all that, Purdy's massive extension forced the 49ers to part ways with nine starting players and replace them all with rookies and cheap journeymen. So when George Kittle went on The Rich Eisen Show this week, he addressed the criticisms of Purdy's contract.

"I don't know what his winning percentage is, but when you win a lot of games and you only need two years to go to the NFC championship or better, I think that's decent," Kittle said. "One of my favorite things that I've heard is everyone calls him a checkdown merchant. And then, the last two years, he's had the least amount of checkdowns as a starting quarterback. So I think he's doing pretty well."

Purdy is doing well. Unfortunately, he's not doing much better than his predecessor, Jimmy Garoppolo, despite being a better quarterback than him. In 36 career starts, Purdy's winning percentage is .639. In Garoppolo's 55 career starts with the 49ers, his winning percentage was .691. Somehow, the 49ers won more frequently with a quarterback who supposedly is vastly inferior.

For all of Garoppolo's limitations, he also went to two NFC Championship Games and a Super Bowl. And he wasn't worth the money the 49ers paid him. Not even close. And Purdy is getting paid much, much more.

What could go wrong?

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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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