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Not settled On Rattay
August 18 2002
By Bryan Hersh of 49ers Paradise
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Recent reports surrounding the 49ers state that if the team isn’t satisfied with Tim Rattay in the pre-season that they will sign a veteran free agent to back up Jeff Garcia. I’m not really sure where to begin when explaining the flaws in this plan.

I guess I’ll start with the team being satisfied enough last season to start the season with Rattay as Garcia’s primary backup. Yes they added Rick Mirer after Garcia’s injury but at the time, Mirer would have been a capable backup.

A quick look through the free agents still remaining shows little promise. Rattay certainly seems better than the alternatives, afterall, even Jim Drukenmiller won a game with the 49ers weapons.

Of course there is the complexity of the 49ers offense. Even with the scaled down version, no veteran joining the team this late in the off-season could learn enough of the playbook to be effective. Just ask Cade McNown.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not satisfied with the 49ers backup quarterback situation at the moment. At times I’ve even wondered if letting Aaron Garcia go so prematurely was the right move, still we have to be realistic people. There isn’t a quarterback on the free agent market that could join the 49ers at this point in the off-season and be more effective than Rattay. It’s not like Steve Young is sitting out there waiting to come back, we’d be lucky to even find a guy like Ty Detmer at this point. Energy focused on finding a solid quarterback at this point of this off-season would be much better spent on helping Tim Rattay master the backup role the 49er envision for him.

Talk about it in the 49ers Paradise Forum

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