According to ProFootballTalk, 49ers quarterback Alex Smith has worked a new two-year deal. Details on the contract have not been released on the team's official site, but we can assume that it's the basic salary for a backup quarterback-- about $2-3 million a year.
This was what was expected for Smith after missing all of last season. As the #1 overall pick in 2005, a lot of pressure was put on a quarterback that the team didn't necessarily have to draft at the time. But now with less pressure, Smith can just focus on trying to get some playing time and possibly become the team's full-time quarterback again. But that's going to be difficult for Smith when Shaun Hill has clearly performed better than he has in the past two seasons.
At least the 49ers are smart enough to give Alex Smith a respectable, logical contract-- unlike last time.
Well, now we can officially call this a Smith vs. Hill battle this off-season-- with a little bit of Damon Huard in the mix. For Smith to ensure that he can play, he has to convince the team that his surgically repaired shoulder is healed. And with that, then he has to perform well enough to beat out Hill. That may not be as hard as it seems since Hill has a record of not performing well during practices.
But now with Smith's new contract in place, the 49ers can move on. With three quarterabcks on the roster, I can assume that the team will not pursue one in the Draft-- at least not with the first pick. The future is a little bit more clear for the 49ers.
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On a note, cornerback Eric Green visited the 49ers on Friday. On Wednesday, Karl Paymah, most recently with Denver, will visit the 49ers. According to Barrows:
Paymah (6-0, 195) ran a 4.35 40 at the 2005 combine and was a third-round pick by the Broncos that year. His best season was 2007 when he beat out Dominique Foxworth for the role of nickel cornerback and started three games. Like the rest of the Broncos defense, Paymah struggled last season and the Denver pass defense finished 26th in the league.
Looks like the 49ers are stabilizing their cornerback core for the future.
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I had hoped that the NFL would mess up and we would get a sneak preview of the new 49ers uniform-- or their logo at least.
NFL Shop has all Draft day hats available for purchase. I went over to the the 49ers hat, but there was no logo change. You can see the item here. The color scheme is still the same and the hat is entirely in black-- the third color of the 49ers' current scheme.
So two assumptions can be made about this. Either the NFL does not want to release information on the new 49ers design or the 49ers will not change logo or color scheme. What do you think?
Comments
Well at least that's out of the way but I still want Hill to win the job. No logo change for the draft day hat? Maybe it will be the current logo with championship color scheme or they could surpise everyone by entirely going classic on draft day.
Personally I hope they go classic. The throwback hat made by Mitchell & Ness is also available in NFL Shop. If the team is going back to championship colors they might as well go with the championship logo.
Bad decision to give Smith the contract extention. wasting money.
I think the hat is just there to boost sales. I really think that there will be a logo change and they are not ready to reveal it just yet.
1.) I think Alex Smith is good kid and I wish him success. I also think Hill is going to clearly win the job unless he blows it bad in preseason games with the starting line-up. If Smith beats out Hill and the only reason why is practices then I'm hanging up my Niner hat. After the last 3 years the writing is on the wall that Shaun does his best in games and that's what counts. The positive to this whole situation is that we have 2 QB's that hopefully can get it done. Not like Dallas... look at what happened with Romo went out for a few.
2.) I think the Uniform change will be some sort of Throwback but nothing dramatic.
I still think JP Losman has a lot of upside, given the right opportunity. He has a pretty strong arm and has the speed to take off and run. I was hoping the 49ers would include him in the competition for starting QB, because he's got the most potential of the QBs left in free agency, in my opinion.
Who cares what they look like on the field. I just hope they win games. They could wear pink unis as long as their winning.
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