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San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan is making things just a little bit difficult for opposing defensive coordinators. On the first drive of the team’s preseason finale against the Las Vegas Raiders, Shanahan split snaps evenly between veteran quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo and rookie QB Trey Lance.
Garoppolo got the start and played the first three snaps, which included a five-yard Raheem Mostert run, a 14-yard pass to George Kittle, and an incomplete pass. Lance then came on for a read handoff to Mostert, which the running back turned into a 17-yard gain.
Trey Lance comes into the game and Kyle goes into his bag and calls QB counter bash. The sky's the limit to SF's ground game pic.twitter.com/rXbkGzTMf9
— Justis Mosqueda (@JuMosq) August 29, 2021
Garoppolo returned for a play, which resulted in a 16-yard Mostert run, and then Lance came on for four straight hand-offs. The 49ers moved down to the Raiders 1-yard line, at which point Garoppolo returned and ran in a touchdown on a play action.
After all of those read-option plays, who had Jimmy Garoppolo as the QB who would run it in for the Niners? pic.twitter.com/3UJJlah4be
— Dieter Kurtenbach (@dieter) August 29, 2021
Shanahan has suggested there will be packages of plays for Lance this season even as Garoppolo remains the starter. The question is how much of that we see. Do we see near even splits at times? The 49ers have put it on tape, but that could also just to keep defensive coordinators on their toes. This should make for an interesting open to the season.