February 24, 2016
INDIANAPOLIS – When Chip Kelly was hired by the San Francisco 49ers to be their new head coach, many made the obvious connections that (A) Kelly acquired Sam Bradford for a high cost in Philly less than a year ago, and (B) the 49ers have an unsettled quarterback position of their own. Therefore, there was a thinking that Kelly could be interested in signing Bradford for the second straight year.
Kelly is not talking at the NFL Combine this year (surprise!), but Niners GM Trent Baalke is, and he was asked what he thought of Bradford as a player.
"We didn't play (the Eagles) last year, so I haven't studied him, relative to what he did with (Kelly's) offense," said Baalke. "But he's a good football player, and he made a lot of plays for them. He does a lot of good things. Without having great working knowledge, once again, I have not studied him in-depth."
Free agency begins in exactly two weeks. Unless Baalke is full of it, if the Niners had interest in Bradford, the general manager of the team would have certainly studied him "in-depth" by now. Certainly this is "smoke screen season," but if we're to believe Baalke's words, one could glean that the Niners have no interest in Bradford.
There's a growing feeling here that the rest of the league has caught up to the notion that Bradford just isn't worth the type of money his camp would like to receive on the open market, which could signal a less expensive return to Philly.
