It's a cliche at this point: if you have two quarterbacks, you have none. But the San Francisco 49ers are not afraid to dream, daring to ask the question: what if you have three?
With incumbent starter Brock Purdy set to have Tommy John surgery in his throwing elbow on Wednesday and 2021 first-rounder Trey Lance potentially being bad at football, the 49ers' quarterback situation exists in a state of perma-flux—over the last few years, it's been impossible to divine who their starting quarterback will be from season to season, let week to week. The solution, according to Bally Sports' Michael Silver, could be Tom Brady, who the 49ers may attempt to lure out of retirement.
“If Purdy’s procedure to repair a torn ulnar collateral ligament ends up knocking him out for most or all of the 2023 season,” Silver writes, “I’d expect the Niners to place a call to Tom Brady to see if there’s any chance they could convince him to end his retirement and play a final season with his hometown team.”
Whew!
Brady, of course, probably won't return. From all outside appearances, Tom Brady seems happily retired, content to pal around with Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin and hone his tight five at Tampa open mics rather than risk life and limb every Sunday.
But if it were going to happen, it would happen here. Whereas the 2022 Buccaneers surrounded Brady with a sclerotic supporting cast, the 49ers have one of the deepest and most talented rosters in the NFL. Even beyond all the hometown nostalgia, the 49ers could appeal to the psycho competitor inside of Brady, offering him a chance to win one more ring on his way out. If they could make the NFC Championship with some weird kludge of Trey Lance, Jimmy Garoppolo, and Brock Purdy, they would be the prohibitive Super Bowl favorites with Brady.
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