The San Francisco 49ers turned heads in March when they shipped a sixth-round pick to the Jaguars in exchange for Blaine Gabbert.
One of the wildest quarterback busts of recent days, the former Jacksonville starter has been reduced to battling for backup duties behind Colin Kaepernick.
"Very impressed with Blaine mentally, physically -- all attributes that you'd like to see in a quarterback," coach Jim Harbaugh said Wednesday, per the team's official website. "He's been very good, very solid. (He's) picked up everything very quickly. It's going well. Everything is progressing well."
Harbaugh's gushing slips beautifully into Around The League's offseason trope file -- specifically the "COACH X: WE'RE EXTREMELY IMPRESSED BY CAMP BODY Y/FADED VET Z" category. Harbaugh, though, promised that reporters will view Gabbert's growth firsthand, saying: "I think you'll watch it when you have a chance to see it today and look at it for yourself."
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To be fair, Gabbert's development has been sabotaged by running three different offenses in as many years. If there's a team with the coaching ability to squeeze the most out of the 2011 No. 10 overall pick, it's the 49ers.
With a thumping run-game and one of the league's top defenses at his disposal, Gabbert has been handed a golden opportunity to improve the many aspects of his game -- his pocket presence, accuracy and vision, for starters -- that never took bloom in Jacksonville. If that doesn't happen in a hurry, Gabbert won't be long for the NFL.
In the latest edition of the "Around The League Podcast," the heroes discuss which teams "realistically" have no shot at winning the Super Bowl this season.
