Brock Purdy played his first preseason game and quickly ended all conversation about who will start for the San Francisco 49ers this season.
Purdy, who tore a ligament in his elbow during the NFC Championship Game, completed 4-of-5 passes for 65 yards while leading the 49ers to a field goal in their 21-20 win over Denver.
“Honestly, it was good to be able to drive and then be able to take some hits and get right up and run a play again right after that,” Brock Purdy said after the game. “It’s part of the game, and honestly, it helps me sort of settle into the game. I thought it was pretty good to be able to go through that.”
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Now, the 49ers can figure out what, if anything, to do with Trey Lance because this is Purdy’s team. After all, he took the team to the NFC championship Game last year, and you can’t convince San Francisco it wouldn’t have won if Purdy hadn’t been injured.
The 49ers traded first-round picks in 2021, 2022, and 2023 and a 2022 third-round pick to Miami, so they could move into the top three and pick Lance.
Injuries and poor performance have limited Lance to eight games and four starts in his first two seasons. He completed 12-of-18 passes for 173 yards with two touchdowns and an interception against Denver while leading the 49ers on their game-winning drive.
“I feel like every time I step on the field, I learn so much. I get so much better from every rep,” Lance said. “Just seeing as many pictures as I can and continue to get as many reps as I can with these guys.”
Lance is competing with Sam Darnold for the backup job
Lance counts $9.3 million against the NFL-mandated salary cap. Darnold counts $5.7 million, and Purdy, a seventh-round pick, counts $889,253. That’s $16 million for three quarterbacks in a league where average quarterbacks earn $20 million a year, the good ones make $40 million a year, and the great ones make $50 million.
So the 49ers can be patient.
Related: Ranking Brock Purdy and the NFL’s 32 starting QBs
Highlights from this week’s NFL preseason action
Patrick Mahomes played the entire first quarter and showed he’s ready for the regular season after completing 10-of-15 passes for 105 yards and a touchdown.
Before their third drive, Mahomes stepped into the huddle and told his dudes the truth about their performance.
“If we don’t want to keep playing, we’d better score,” Mahomes said after the game.
Apparently, that was the motivation they needed. The Chiefs drove 92 yards in 10 plays, and Mahomes capped off the drive with an 18-yard touchdown pass to Justin Watson.
“Offensively, we had a few hiccups early.,” coach Andy Reid said. “We’ve got to take care of business with that.”
Daniel Jones, who signed a four-year, $160-million deal in the offseason, played well in a 21-19 win over Carolina.
He completed 8-of-9 passes for 69 yards and a touchdown. This is the type of performance the Giants need from Jones because he must outplay Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts and Dallas’ Dak Prescott to win the NFC East.
And the Giants are paying him to be one of the top 10 quarterbacks in the league. That’s a lot to ask from a player with 36 touchdowns and 22 interceptions in the last three seasons.
He’s averaged just 209.1 yards passing per game.
“I thought we did some good things,” said Jones, who is entering his fifth season and is coming off a breakout year in which he helped New York reach the playoffs. “I thought we executed pretty well. A couple of plays could sharpen up a few things there, we’ll look to do that. But overall, I thought we executed well.”
Bryce Young played 21 snaps. They were largely uneventful.
He completed 3-of-6 passes for 35 yards while playing into the second quarter. But he did lead the Panthers on a 15-play, 62-yard that took 10:21 but resulted only in a field goal.
“It’s limited opportunities, but you’ve got to make those count,” Young said after the game. “And I think, just listening to coaches stressing urgency of every situation, every down.
“You get a limited amount of reps in the preseason, but you have to make them count. Because of that, there’s a lot of emphasis to be the best we can.”
It was a 12-yard run in a preseason game no one will remember a few years from now, but it served notice that rookie running back Bijan Robinson is going to be a problem. He went off right tackle, took a hard cut up field, wriggled through a small hole, and then made a safety miss before being tackled.
Wow.
“It felt awesome,” Robinson said. “It was definitely a blessing to be out there and to show little snippets of the gift God has given me. I know it’s the preseason, but I was ready to go.”
“We looked very explosive (on the first drive). I know it didn’t end how we wanted to and had a couple penalties, but I thought we looked really explosive when we were out there.”
Robinson finished with four carries for 20 yards in his only series. He also caught one pass for six yards.
Related: Bijan Robinson and the top NFL Rookie of the Year candidates
Tampa Bay Buccaneers QB situation and more NFL preseason notes
Baker Mayfield began the night as the favorite to be named Tampa Bay’s starter. Then Kyle Trask turned in a performance that tightened the competition.
The third-year quarterback completed 20-of-28 passes for 218 yards and a touchdown in a 13-6 win over the Jets.
“Poise. Poise in the pocket. A lot more athleticism – he used his legs when he had to, and he was very successful at that,” Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles said after the game. “He threw the ball where he was supposed to throw it – he threw some pinpoint passes.”
The wait for a starter continues.
New York Jets quarterback Zach Wilson had one of the best plays from the weekend.
Wilson became a backup the moment Aaron Rodgers joined the Jets. Plays like his 35-yard run will give coach Robert Saleh one more thing to consider. Wilson completed 9-of-13 passes for 70 yards.
But his run was the talk of the game.
Facing a heavy rush, he stepped up in the pocket and spun right to elude a sack. Then he headed up the right sideline and somehow juked two Tampa defenders along the sideline near midfield.
He cut inside around the 30 and launched himself into a defender at the Tampa 25. He was finally brought down at the Tampa 22.
New England Patriots’ Isaiah Bolden, the only player drafted from an HBCU in 2023, was taken off the field on a stretcher.
Bolden, a seventh-round pick from Jackson State, appeared to collide with teammate Calvin Munson while attempting to tackle Green Bay’s Malik Heath.
The team released a statement Sunday saying he had full use of all his limbs.
“Appreciate the prayers more excited to be back with the guys,” Boldin wrote on X.
The game was called with 10:29 to go, as the Patriots said the decision came via “mutual agreement of the teams.” The Patriots also canceled their joint practices with Tennessee that were scheduled for this week.
The most interesting aspect of Tua Tagovailoa’s performance against Houston was the Jim-Jitsu roll he used when he got hit in the pocket.
The roll is designed to help him avoid having his head snap back and hit the turf when he’s hit.
“I mean, you just have to continue to rep it. We do some things at the facility that help keep up with that, but it’s football,” Tagovailoa said. “There’s hits that you’re going to see that you know you can fall, and then there’s others where you’re not going to be able to see, and it’s how you react to it.
“It’s a physical sport. It’s tough. But yeah, went out there and was expecting to get hit, was expecting to go to the ground, all of that.”
C.J. Stroud played the entire first half against the Dolphins with mixed results in a 28-3 loss.
He completed 7-of-12 passes for just 60 yards. He played four series and led the Texans to a field goal.
An interception gave the Texans the ball at the Miami 7 on their first series, but a delay of game on third-and-goal from the Miami 1 helped wreck the drive.
“The plan was just for me to play,” Stroud told reporters after the game. “They [Slowik and Jerrod Johnson] just wanted me to play. Go out there and try to diagnose the defense like we did in practice.”