Sudfeld seems poised to earn No. 3 QB spot
After he completed 6 of 6 passes Saturday, capping the perfect practice performance with a slant to wide receiver Deebo Samuel on the final snap, the 49ers quarterback smiled when asked about his day at the office.
“It was definitely a nice feeling,” he said. “It was a lot of fun. I felt like I was pretty dialed in.”
Starting QB Jimmy Garoppolo? Nope. Rookie hotshot Trey Lance? Incorrect. Former No. 10 pick Josh Rosen? Try again.
The answer: Nate Sudfeld. Easily the most anonymous member of the 49ers’ QB group, Sudfeld appears poised to beat out Rosen for the No. 3 spot this season.
Sudfeld, 27, a 2016 sixthround pick from Indiana with 37 career pass attempts, doesn’t have Rosen’s pedigree. Unlike Rosen, however, he has a strong connection with QBs coach Rich Scangarello and guaranteed money in his contract. Most importantly: He’s been more consistent than Rosen early in camp.
On Tuesday, Rosen completed 1 of 3 passes in team drills and both incompletions were throws that weren’t close to open targets. Rosen, shoulders slumped, walked away shaking his head after his second incompletion, a sailer intended for wideout River Cracraft. Sudfeld hasn’t betrayed similar frustration this summer while immersing himself in an offense that’s intrigued him since he entered the NFL.
In 2016, as a rookie with Washington, Sudfeld was with QB Kirk Cousins and offensive coordinator Sean McVay, who spoke glowingly about 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan and his system. Cousins, now with the Vikings, and McVay, the Rams’ head coach, spent multiple seasons with Shanahan when he was Washington’s offensive coordinator. Last year, his fourth season with the Eagles, Sudfeld was with Scangarello, a Shanahan devotee who is in his second stint as the 49ers QB coach.
“I’ve always really admired Kyle … I would pick (Scangarello’s) brain about the scheme in San Francisco,” Sudfeld said. “Not thinking that would be where I’d go. I just like to learn ball and I was always curious about it. And then, after the season, the opportunity came up and I was like, ‘Yeah, this is where I want to go.’ I just want to keep developing, keep learning football and be around some great coaches and great minds.”
The 49ers signed Sudfeld to
a oneyear, $990,000 deal with $252,000 guaranteed in April when the 49ers already had Rosen and sincereleased QB Josh Johnson on the roster. Shanahan decided to add Sudfeld, 6foot6 and 227 pounds, after studying his limited NFL tape and college career.
Sudfeld’s last game, in the 2020 regularseason finale, wasn’t a memorable appearance. Eagles coach Doug Pederson replaced starter Jalen Hurts with Sudfeld in the fourth quarter and Sudfeld threw an interception and lost a fumble on his first two drives in a 2014 loss to Washington. There was speculation Pederson made the unexpected QB switch to deliberately lose the game and improve Philadelphia’s draft position at the end of a 4111 season. Pederson said Sudfeld, who hadn’t appeared in the first 15 games, “deserved an opportunity to get some snaps.”
But Shanahan saw more than that performance. Sud
feld has completed 114 of 201 passes for 1,299 yards with nine touchdowns and three interceptions (84.9 rating) in preseason games. He completed 20 of 25 passes for 156 yards with a touchdown (106.0 rating) in three games over the 2017 and 2018 seasons, his only regularseason action before the 2020 finale. It also helped that Sudfeld received a strong recommendation from Scangarello, who was an Eagles offensive assistant in 2020.
“The tape that we do have on him, we really liked him,” Shanahan said. “Just his skill set, his size, how he can throw … and he’s also a lot more athletic than people give him credit for. But when you have (Scangarello) who was in that building who worked with (him) every day to tell you what type of guy he is, so you know what you’re getting, that made it pretty easy for us to target him early.”
Sudfeld was born in Santa Clara and lived in San Jose until he was 5 before his fam
ily moved to Modesto, where he attended high school. Sudfeld’s father, Ralph, is the CEO of Assist International, a humanitarian organization that has completed more than 600 projects, such as building schools and orphanages, in over 60 countries. Sudfeld’s mom, Michelle, and brother, Matt, are on staff. Sudfeld has taken four mission trips to Uganda, the first when he was 13 and the last in 2019.
Sudfeld, a selfdescribed perfectionist who can get obsessive about football, said his faith has grounded him as he’s battled to earn a bigger role in the NFL.
“You do get the perspective of just being able to separate it — there is more to life than football,” Sudfeld said. “But when you’re in football, be where your feet are and just enjoy the process. That perspective is huge.”