Colin Kaepernick, Jim Harbaugh’s latest quarterback, sounds a lot like Todd Mortensen, Jim Harbaugh’s first quarterback.

The common thread? They both love football as much as, well, Jim Harbaugh.

Mortensen, Harbaugh’s quarterback at the University of San Diego in 2004, said he had a great rapport with his former coach. And he explained that their connection was based on a shared fanaticism for all things football.

“I wanted to come in on a Tuesday morning at 8 o’clock when I didn’t have class and watch film with him and study the game plan,” Mortensen said in January. “And just be a professional in the way that I went about my job as far as being a quarterback. And Jim’s the same way as a coach. He loves football. And he loves what he does as a coach. He can’t wait to come in and put the game plan together and watch film and get on the practice field and coach his players up. So Jim and I really shared that passion and enthusiasm for the game and we really loved doing it.”

It’s actually not just Mortensen and Kaepernick. Examine each of Harbaugh’s handpicked quarterbacks and the theme is constant.

Mortensen came by his passion honestly – he is the son of a former NFL quarterback. And so is Stanford’s Andrew Luck, who was religiously breaking down film in high school. Josh Johnson, who followed Mortensen at USD, is another football junkie. This 2006 story in the San Diego Union Tribune includes this revealing line: “His freshman roommates at USD fell asleep to the sound of Johnson studying videotape.”

Now comes Kaepernick, a former pitcher with a 94-mile-per-hour fastball who had college coaches and major-league scouts pursuing him at Pitman High School. Kaepernick turned down countless baseball scholarship offers to accept the one football scholarship offered he received from Nevada, a mid-level Division I program. The reason, of course, is because his first love was football.

I’m guessing Harbaugh loved that part of Kaepernick’s bio.

This article by Sports Illustrated’s Peter King highlights the connection between Kaepernick and his new coach and has a great quote from an unnamed draft analyst: “Harbaugh drafted himself,” he said.

Based on Harbaugh’s history, that would seem to bode well for Kaepernick, who could have a steep NFL learning curve.

Mortensen, after all, was a project who transferred to USD from BYU for his senior season. In three unsightly seasons as a backup at BYU, he completed 27 of 77 passes with one touchdown and four interceptions. After one season with Harbaugh, though, he was on the NFL radar. He signed free-agent contracts with the Lions and Patriots and played briefly in the Canadian Football League.

When I spoke to him January, Mortensen acknowledged that he’s wondered what could have happened if he’d spent another season obsessing over football with Harbaugh.

Kaepernick won’t have to wonder.

And if he fails to develop into an above-average NFL quarterback, it doesn’t sound as if it will be for lack of effort.

Colin Kaepernick is a project. He might have a bigger upside than No. 1 overall pick Cam Newton. And, oh my goodness, wait until you see the 49ers’ second-round pick throw lasers while rolling to his left.

At least that’s the opinion of former Niners quarterback Trent Dilfer, who appeared on the Murph & Mac Show on KNBR (click here and scroll down) today two days after wrapping up his duties as an ESPN draft analyst.

Among other topics, Dilfer discussed Kaepernick’s biggest challenge as he develops in the NFL and the relationship he could share with Alex Smith. Speaking of Smith, he offered his opinion on what Jim Harbaugh sees in the former No. 1 overall pick who was Dilfer’s teammate for two years in San Francisco.

Here we go:

• Dilfer said he preferred TCU’s Andy Dalton to Kaepernick, but the Niners didn’t share that view. The Bengals drafted Dalton with the 35th overall pick and the Niners traded up to get Kaepernick at No. 36.

“I do know, knowing enough about the 49ers, that Kaepernick is the guy that they loved,” Dilfer said. “The high ceiling that he had and the time he spent with him. They are very excited about it.”

• Dilfer, who has a place in Lake Tahoe, watched plenty of Kaepernick’s games at Nevada. But he didn’t form a concrete opinion on his NFL potential until he broke down film in preparation for the draft.

“When I was done with my study there were a few things I wrote down,” Dilfer said. “One, he’s a project. It’s going to take a couple years to get him right. To get him completely comfortable playing in a traditional offense. Number two … (he has) maybe the highest ceiling of the draft. I think his ceiling for success may be higher than Cam Newton’s. He might be a better athlete than Cam Newton when you look at it. He’s got quicker feet. He’s got better pocket instincts and when he hits full stride, when he gets unleashed and he’s running full stride, it’s pretty amazing to see.”

• Dilfer said Kaepernick was “incredibly accurate” when he got his body in the proper position. He said Kaepernick has the proverbial “cannon for an arm,” but can also change speeds – that is, he has good touch.

Dilfer said Kaepernick was most impressive when throwing out of the pocket.

“He throws the ball to the left, when he’s rolling to the left, better than any quarterback I’ve ever seen in my life,” Dilfer said.

• Dilfer believes Kaepernick will need to develop for at least a year, but he shouldn’t be surgically attached to a clipboard while he learns. Why waste those wheels?

“I think you’ll see him as a package player early on for the 49ers, a guy that comes in and creates a threat from the quarterback position, especially on third down,” Dilfer said.

Jim Harbaugh didn’t get into specifics — putting Kaepernick in the Wildcat as a rookie, for example — but he said Friday he planned to take advantage of his running ability.

• So why, exactly, is Kaepernick a project? Dilfer said Kaepernick, like most quarterbacks who play in a spread or Pistol offense, will need to learn to make quicker decisions and tougher reads in the NFL after years spent dinking an dunking.

“The one thing he’s able to do in the Pistol was … most of their quick-decision passes were to the perimeter,” Dilfer said. “I call them pick-and-stick throws. Isolation throws on the outside where you know you have a one-on-one, you catch, set, throw to the outside.

“A lot of the quicker decisions you have to make in the NFL are in-between the numbers. And on the inside of the field there are a lot more bodies. So it’s a lot different information to digest. That’s the hardest thing for young quarterbacks is making the quick decisions in the middle of the field because they’re not asked to do a lot of it in college.”

• Why is Jim Harbaugh such a fan of Alex Smith? Dilfer said that former quarterbacks are sympathetic to those in the fraternity who have drawn the short straw on “situation and training.”

An example of a good situation: Dilfer with Jamal Lewis in the backfield and the Ravens’ defense on the sideline. An example of good training: Joe Montana with Bill Walsh.

“A quarterback, no matter how talented he is, is only as good as the situation he’s put in and the training he receives,” Dilfer said. “And Jim believes in both of those things. And they’re going to give Alex as good a training as any quarterback in this league will get and they’re going to put him in an ideal situation.

“They look for certain qualities that they respect and Alex has all those. They’re going to do the things he does best and they’re going to provide an infrastructure and an environment where he can be successful. So I believe Jim sees the diamond in the rough in both Alex Smith and Colin Kaepernick.”

• Would Alex Smith turn impolite when pushed by a hotshot rookie for a starting job? Dilfer can’t see it. He thinks Smith would be a willing mentor to Kaepernick.

“Alex Smith’s as good a human being and as much of a professional as you’ll find in this league at the quarterback position,” Dilfer said. “And, yeah, he wants to be a great player, he’ll continue to grind out and be the best he can be, but he’ll be more than happy to mentor and help a young kid along as well.”

By the way, Smith, who will be entering his seventh NFL season, will turn 27 on Saturday. He is only three-and-half years older than Kaepernick, 23, who was born on Nov. 3, 1987.

Jim Harbaugh was surprisingly candid Saturday when asked about the likelihood of Alex Smith re-signing with the 49ers.

But the Niners’ chatty coach had to be more restrained when discussing another quarterback he’d like to have on the roster. In a brief informal session after his post-draft press conference, Harbaugh said there was a specific undrafted quarterback he was interested in signing to a free-agent contract.

Due to the lockout, he couldn’t reveal a name, but there are some clues suggesting the mystery man could be former Louisville quarterback Adam Froman from Santa Rosa.

I spoke to Froman on Sunday (here’s the newspaper story) and he said the 49ers, Falcons and Dolphins contacted him (or his agent) during the final rounds of the draft and said they were interested in drafting him. The Niners contacted Froman several times before the draft, but did not conduct a personal workout or bring him in for a visit.

Froman said he thinks Saturday’s late-round calls could have been inspired by the lockout. You know, since NFL teams couldn’t speak with potential free agents after the draft, they made some calls while contact was still allowed.

“Whether they were trying to really draft me or not, it was showing me that they were interested,” Froman said. “So that when they do offer a free-agent contract, if they do, then I’m like, ‘OK, well these guys were interested me in the draft so I should go there.’ I think that’s more of what that was than an actual hey-we’re-going-to-draft-you phone call.”

Based on the post-draft comments of general manager Trent Baalke, it appears Froman, who graduated with a 3.83 GPA, gets an A for analysis.

Baalke was asked if he was able to make free-agent calls during the draft.

His response: “All we were doing during the draft was calling guys to let them know we had a lot of picks at the back end of the draft. And we were trying to gauge the enthusiasm that these guys may have for being a 49er. As far as talking about free agency and all that moving forward, no.”

NFL teams generally call players during the draft to take them with their next pick, not take their temperature. Do you think the 49ers dialed up Aldon Smith to gauge his enthusiasm?

• The strong-armed 6-foot-4, 219-pound Froman is light on experience and missed 10 games in two seasons at Louisville due to three separate injuries (back, oblique, thigh). He only had 15 Division I starts, but he appears to have many of the qualities Harbaugh wants in a quarterback.

In fact, if Colin Kaepernick is Cam Newton Light, Froman might be Colin Kaepernick Extra Light. OK, since he wasn’t drafted, how about Extra, Extra Light?

Athleticism? At his pro day, Froman ran the 40-yard dash in an unofficial time of 4.55 seconds, which would have ranked third among quarterbacks at the NFL Combine (he wasn’t invited). His times in the three-cone drill (6.6 seconds) and 20-yard shuttle (4.08) would have ranked first.

Smarts? There is that 3.83 GPA (Froman said he didn’t know what he scored on his Wonderlic, but answered 44 questions).

Does he work hard? Does he love football? Louisville offensive coordinator Mike Sanford knows a little about Harbaugh’s passion for the game. Sanford was the Chargers wide receivers coach when Harbaugh played in San Diego from 1999-2000.

“Adam will grind as much or more as Jim Harbaugh,” Sanford said in March. “… Adam is right up the alley as far as what Jim is looking for in a quarterback.”

Froman conceded Sunday that he’ll enter his first NFL training camp with a chip on his shoulder.

“If a team takes a chance on me they’re not going to be sorry,” he said. “I’m going to work harder than anyone else out there and I’m going to earn myself a spot.”

• Froman grew up as a 49ers fan, but said he won’t make any decisions with his heart.

“From a fan’s perspective, yeah, the Niners would be my ultimate place to be,” he said. “But I can’t look at it as a fan right now. This is a job and this is a business. This is my career at stake here. So I have to look at it from a very objective, black-and-white perspective. What’s the best business decision for me?”

This and that from the second day of the NFL draft:

• Colin Kaepernick’s arrival in San Francisco in no way signals Alex Smith’s departure.

Smith was one of a group of roughly 15 players to visit the Niners’ facility Friday prior to the reinstatement of the NFL lockout and he met with Harbaugh.

“The plan for Alex is unchanged,” Harbaugh said. “Everything that we’ve said from the very beginning; we want to get the best players on our roster that we possibly can, then throw out the balls and let them compete. Alex has the ability and the license to be the starting quarterback … The same goes for Colin. Guys run on their own gas. That’s what we believe. We believe in competition. We believe in earning positions around here.”

But will Smith want to earn his spot in San Francisco, where, at best, he’ll be keeping the seat warm while Kaepernick develops? The NFL’s labor situation obviously clouds the situation, but Smith could potentially sign with another team (Arizona? Seattle?) where he wouldn’t have a hotshot rookie on his heels.

Still, the circumstantial evidence suggests Smith wants to stay put. Why else is he meeting with Harbaugh, a coach with whom he’s apparently struck up a kinship?

“It was just good being around Alex again today,” Harbaugh said.

• Harbaugh was asked about Kaepernick being used in the Wildcat formation as a rookie.

Kaepernick, the only quarterback in NCAA history with three straight 1,000-yard rushing seasons, averaged 6.9 yards a carry during his career. He ran over and around Cal – rushing for 148 yards on 17 carries and scoring three touchdowns – in a 52-31 win last year.

Harbaugh didn’t spell out whether his new quarterback would line up in the Wildcat. But he suggested Kaepernick’s athleticism would allow the Niners to open up their offensive playbook.

“We have QB-driven runs in our scheme,” Harbaugh said. “Are we that kind of team? Yes. We are that kind of team. Are we a three-step, drop-back team? Yes. Are we a play-action team? Yes. Are we a move-out-of-the-pocket team, absolutely. Definitely. Colin has arm talent, has athletic ability. He has all the capabilities to really run anything that we ask him to do.”

• There are few NFL-ready rookies and the 49ers don’t appear to have any with their first three picks.

Aldon Smith could prove to be an exception, but Baalke has acknowledge he’s “raw” and will face a steep learning curve in transitioning from defensive end to 3-4 outside linebacker.

Kaepernick, like most first-year quarterbacks, doesn’t figure to be a season-opening starter.

And then there’s South Carolina’s Chris Culliver, a third-round pick who played seven games in college at cornerback, his position in the NFL. Culliver was a wide receiver as a freshman at South Carolina before moving to free safety.

Baalke highlighted his versatility, but acknowledged his inexperience.

“Well I think coach (Harbaugh) mentioned it earlier, for all of these guys that are learning new positions and whether they played the position at the college level or whether they didn’t, when they come up to the National Football League there’s a learning curve,” Baalke said. “So in some ways it can be beneficial because he doesn’t have maybe as many bad habits as he might have.”

• Is Kaepernick’s delivery too long? Harbaugh suggested his arm strength and ability to make quick reads compensated for any problems with his motion.

“To me, it’s can you process the information,” Harbaugh said. “How long does it take to get the ball out from the time you see the target open, or coming open, until the ball gets to the receiver? He’s very fast in processing that and the ball gets there fast. He’s got the kind of arm strength to really power a ball through a defense … Everybody throws it different. There’s no one perfect way mechanically to throw a football.”

• Are the 49ers done drafting quarterbacks? In light of the labor uncertainty, I’d expect them to draft another signal-caller with one of their final eight picks.

“We’re going to continue to do what our game plan was to bring in the best three quarterbacks possible for our roster,” Baalke said. “So whether we’re done adding to it, through the draft, through free agency, through trades, that remains to be seen. It’s still a fluid situation.”

Before the 49ers shocked Aldon Smith by taking him with the No. 7 pick, they surprised him during his pre-draft visit to San Francisco.

Smith expected the Niners to test his football acumen. But not like this: How wide is a football field?

At his press conference in Santa Clara today, the former Missouri defensive end laughed when recalling the 50-question, do-you-know-your-football questionnaire.

He copped to missing a few questions on the pop quiz and was reminded of one in particular from a voice in the back of the room.

“Knute Rockne,” test administrator Jim Harbaugh said. “Who was Knute Rockne.”

Smith smiled at the 49ers coach.

“I forgot that one,” he said.

Not much news trickled out of Smith welcome meet-and-greet with the media, but the revelation of the questionnaire made it clear that Harbaugh is serious about wanting his players to have a passion for football. Right down to possessing knowledge of a Notre Dame coach who died 80 years ago.

By the way, a football field is 160 feet, or 53 1/3 yards, wide.

• Smith spoke with defensive end Justin Smith, a fellow Missouri star, on the practice field today. He also ran into safety Taylor Mays and linebacker Thaddeus Gibson in the weight room.

He said his visit hasn’t included any Xs-and-Os talk, but he hopes to leave with a playbook.

• Smith is racking up the frequent flyer miles. After flying in from New York today, he’ll travel back to New York tonight before heading to Missouri on Monday.

He was running on five hours of sleep today.

“It hasn’t all kicked in yet,” he said. “But I’m enjoying every bit of it.”

• Smith doesn’t know what number he’ll sport in the NFL. He wore 85 at Missouri because it was his number at Raytown Senior (Mo.) High, where he also played tight end.

• Just to clarify a point: Smith missed three games with a broken fibula last year, but actually had five weeks between games.

He suffered the injury Sept. 18 against San Diego State and returned to action on Oct. 23 against Oklahoma.