San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo couldn’t help but crack a bit of a smile as things went from bad to worse for his team in Sunday’s NFC Championship Game against the Philadelphia Eagles.
During the 49ers’ first offensive drive of the game, starting quarterback Brock Purdy suffered an elbow injury and had to be taken out. On that same play, Purdy fumbled the football as he was hit, and the 49ers recovered.
In the third quarter, backup quarterback Josh Johnson (San Fran’s fourth different quarterback used this year) suffered a concussion and had to be removed. For the 31-year-old Garoppolo, there was simply no choice but to kind of laugh at all the unfortunate events hitting his team.
San Francisco lost starting quarterback Trey Lance for the year back in Week 2 with an ankle injury. Then Garoppolo, the team’s main starting signal-caller from 2017 to 2021, suffered a foot injury in Week 13 against the Miami Dolphins.
Purdy won all five of his regular season starts and guided San Fran to its third NFC title game appearance in four years. It’s simply unfortunate that his uncredible rookie season had to end this way.
