The 49ers have made it clear that Brock Purdy is likely to be their starting quarterback to begin the season if he’s healthy. And from all accounts, Purdy appears to be on track to do just that after undergoing elbow surgery earlier in the offseason.
But Purdy’s rehab has provided an opportunity for 2021 No. 3 overall pick Trey Lance to get first-team reps along with free agent signee Sam Darnold. Lance and Darnold were also at the Tight End University event in Nashville last week, where San Francisco’s George Kittle told Jennifer Lee Chan of NBCSportsBayArea.com about some of Lance’s progress entering 2023.
“Trey has been great,” Kittle said, via David Bonilla of 49erswebzone.com. “I think he took steps forward in the OTAs. It’s really fun when you start connecting on plays that you might have struggled [with] in the past, and that’s something that we did at OTAs a couple of times, so that was fun. Got to get a lot of extra work in with them.”
While Purdy’s been out, Kittle has been able to up his chemistry with Lance through their work on the field and their conversations off of it. Kittle noted that he’d like to emulate what Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce have going on with the Chiefs, since their partnership is clearly a significant factor in Kansas City’s offensive success.
“I just like talking ball with [Lance], too, because one of the things that Kelce was saying about him and Patrick is just they communicate about certain things, and there’s talk through everything,” Kittle said. “So as long as they’re on the same page, it doesn’t really matter what the defense does. You can find that spot, or he’s going to know what Travis is going to do on any given play because they’ve repped so many times, they’ve talked about it so many times.
“So just having that opportunity to sit down and talk with Trey, watch film with him, and having this event, too, because Trey sat next to me through our meetings. For him to be able to watch guys talk about routes and stuff like that, to see how other tight ends are talking about it, he learns stuff from that, too. So it’s just a fun opportunity for him.”
Lance could theoretically earn San Francisco’s starting QB job during training camp. But because of Purdy’s success in 2022, that outcome feels unlikely.
Still, with the way the 49ers have had to utilize multiple QBs over the last few years, there’s reason to believe Lance could get an opportunity to play sooner than later in 2023. Any chemistry Lance has built with Kittle will serve him well.