Chargers not ruling out Kaepernick
Anthony Lynn is again praising the skills of Colin Kaepernick. The L.A. Chargers coach says that while his team has no plans to sign the ostracized quarterback, he would be an options in case of emergency.
“It would be crazy to not have him on your workout list,” Lynn told reporters on Wednesday. “I haven’t spoken with Colin, not sure where he’s at as far as in his career and what he wants to do, but Colin fits the style of quarterback for the system that we’re going to be running.
“I’m very confident and happy with the three quarterbacks that I have, but you can never have too many people waiting on the runway.”
The three Chargers QBS Lynn likes so much combined to throw six passes last season. They are Justin Hebert, the No. 6 pick in the 2020 draft, Tyrod Taylor, who made six throws as a backup last season, and Easton Stick, a fifth-round pick in 2019 who has never played an NFL down.
Kaepernick last played in 2016, when he amassed a 1-10 record in 11 starts for the San Francisco 49ers. His completion percentage on 331 throws was 59.2, while he had 16 touchdown passes and just four interceptions. He was also the team’s second-leading rusher with 468 yards, an average of 6.8 yards per carry.
If he isn’t considered good enough to crack the Chargers QB depth chart, it’s hard to imagine him finding a home with another NFL team.
BRONCOS GREAT DIES: It’s actually possible that players can achieve everlasting recognition for things they didn’t do.
What Jerry Sturm famously didn’t do is cheat.
Oh, make no mistake, Sturm was a stud. Last year, he was even listed among the top 100 players in Denver Broncos franchise history.
That honour will no doubt be mentioned when his friends and family gather (six feet apart) to raise a glass in his memory some day very soon. The Colorado restaurant he owned announced on Wednesday that Sturm has died at the age of 83.
Longtime CFL fans might also take a moment to acknowledge Sturm, who began his professional career with the Saskatchewan Roughriders in 1958 before joining the Calgary Stampeders for the ’59 and ’60 seasons.
From there, he headed south to start his NFL career with the Broncos in ’61 (for six seasons), before stops in New Orleans (for four seasons), Houston (for one season) and Philadelphia, where he had a one-game swan song in 1972.
As good as he was, Sturm was an offensive lineman. Generally
speaking, Joe Fan curses those guys more for missing blocks than praise them for making blocks.
Sturm is best remembered for an incident in 1971, when he was offered US$10,000 by a friend and former teammate to throw a game. Sturm, who was making $30,000 and playing centre, informed the FBI.
“The guy and a gambler from L.A. offered me a bribe to snap the ball badly on extra points and field goals, and maybe blow a snap to the quarterback, stuff like that,” Sturm told The Houston Chronicle, per Pro Football Talk. “So I turned ’em in. I was really shocked. The guy was one of my best buddies when I played with him.”
The only other such uncovered scandal in NFL history was in 1946, when gamblers offered two members of the New York Giants $2,500 and lucrative off-season jobs to throw the championship game against the Chicago Bears. That plot was exposed before kickoff, too.
Sturm, meanwhile, deserves his everlasting recognition for doing the right thing.