Colin Kaepernick, Not Alex Smith, to Start Against New Orleans Saints

Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images North America

Semi-surprising news out of the Bay Area this evening. San Francisco 49ers (7-2-1) head coach Jim Harbaugh has decided to give Colin Kaepernick the nod to be the starting quarterback over Alex Smith against the New Orleans Saints (5-5) this Sunday, Nov. 25. This was reported by Sports Illustrated's Jim Trotter. The decision, according to Trotter, was not based upon health issues, as Smith had been previously dealing with concussion syndromes after being dealt a concussion two weeks ago against the St. Louis Rams.

This decision comes as somewhat of a surprise to much of the NFL world. Smith, who had previously completed 25 of his last 27 passes, was of course the confident starter of the 49ers, while Kaepernick would come in through situational offensive packages. After an impressive playoff performance last year, Smith looked to be revitalizing his career. Now, though, Kaepernick is getting the start after an extremely impressive performance against the vaunted Chicago Bears defense. And Smith, now, will have to be on the bench to watch.

From all perspectives, I can see why Harbaugh would make this move and to be honest I think it is an extremely smart maneuver. While some would say that Alex Smith's confidence and "mental toughness" may be shattered, I would counter that point by saying this: who would have more mental toughness than Alex Smith? Think of the last seven years and every twist and turn that Smith has been on. If he can't go through this, I'll be shocked. 

On a second note, let's say Kaepernick struggles. Well, then you have Smith come into the game, and he picks up the offense and if he does well, then he looks like a million bucks. It may not be "that easy," but doing this makes it look infinitely easier than having Kaepernick come in for Smith if, heaven forbid, he struggles. Then, Smith would be ganged up on by just about every pundit in America, and the 49ers fanbase might wind up being alienated in the process as well. I suspect that there's probably already a bit of a divide and a bit of a weird reaction to this.

Finally, from a football perspective, Kaepernick is stepping into a heck of a confidence-boosting situation. After going against a pretty tough Rams defense (on skill-players alone), he was faced up with the Chicago Bears. The Bears, as most footballers know run the Cover-2 defense and they don't like to shy away from that or try to mix it up at all. They played extremely vanilla against him, and in fact might have been more brash than they should have been. They hardly mixed it up, they rarely brought any pressure (They weren't expecting him to play well, and that's exactly what he did, and it made him look like a million bucks. 

Now, Kaepernick goes down to the Superdome to play a Saints defense that, while it will look a lot more exotic to him, is extremely porous from what we've seen. They'll ramp up the pressure, but it benefits Kaepernick that he has the best offensive line in the National Football League to protect him. Joe Staley has been absolutely tremendous this season in both run and pass blocking, and so have Mike Iupati, Jonathan Goodwin, Alex Boone, and Anthony Davis. The Saints like to attack from the inside mostly, but the 49ers definitely have the support to keep Kaepernick cool and collected in the pocket, and as we've seen, he can do a lot on the ground as well. 

So, in summation, this is probably the best maneuver for the 49ers at this point in their season with no disrespect to Alex Smith. And like I said, if Kaepernick does struggle, they do have a pretty decent option behind him in their back pocket.