Kittle tells hilarious story of learning Lance was 49ers' pick

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Like everyone else in the lead up to the 2021 NFL Draft, George Kittle was kept in the dark about who the 49ers planned to select with the No. 3 overall pick.

Kittle undoubtedly was excited to learn who his new teammate would be, but he had to wait longer than the rest of us to learn that coach Kyle Shanahan had tabbed Trey Lance as the signal-caller of the future.

"You want to know something crazy about the draft, Rich?" Kittle asked host Rich Eisen on Wednesday on "The Rich Eisen Show." "So, I'm taking off on a plane to go to my bachelor party in Scottsdale during the draft, and during the draft my flight was taking off as the third pick was announced, and so I didn't see it until I could connect to Wi-Fi about 30 minutes later. So literally it goes, 'The pick is in!' and then it cut out. So I sat there for 30 minutes like, 'Alright!' I'm sweaty and I don't know what's going on.

"Who did we pick? This is stressful. I can't call anybody. But then, yeah, I finally connect to the Wi-Fi after it gets to the 10,000 feet and I was like, 'Alright! Sweet! Sick! Cool! This is going to be fun.' Trey-bay-bay."

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Kittle shared the field with Lance for the first time during 49ers OTAs this week, and was impressed with the 21-year-old.

"I was really excited yesterday, he made an awesome throw on a play action," Kittle said of Lance on Tuesday. "He found my rookie Josh Pederson on a far corner on a roll-out which is the last guy you would throw it to on the play. The fact that he found him on his first ever roll-out is pretty cool."

"He looks better out there than a rookie quarterback. When he’s out there, he’s slinging it."

As far as early returns go, it sounds like Lance was worth the wait for Kittle and the 49ers.

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