Less than 24 hours after a near separation, the marriage
between Mike Singletary and Alex Smith remains intact.
For at least one more week.
A day after nearly benching his starting quarterback during
a 27-24 loss to the Eagles, Singletary said Smith will retain his job when the
Niners host the Raiders on Sunday.
Singletary said his decision was based on Smith’s
response after he was nearly yanked from the game.
On the 49ers’ next two drives, Smith completed 10 of 11
passes for 99 yards and tossed two touchdowns to pull San Francisco to within
27-24 with 2:02 left. With a chance to send the game into overtime, Smith, who
was hit as he threw, fluttered a game-sealing interception on third-and-10 from
the Eagles 44 with 36 seconds left.
Singletary characterized Smith as a quarterback who plays
well for long stretches, but “when he starts pressing
a little bit too much, then that’s when bad things happen.” Singletary said Smith
played with more of a nothing-to-lose mentality late in the fourth quarter.
“When you go back in the game,
you have the opportunity, to me, to really show what you’re made of,”
Singletary said. “I think when he went back in, I don’t think he pressed. I
think he really played more true to who he is. I think he threw the ball clean …
I think after the conversation that we had on the sideline, he forgot about all
the other stuff and just went out and played quarterback. Just went out and
played football.”
Singletary said backup David Carr will not get more snaps
in practice and that he wanted to “exhaust everything with Alex Smith.” Smith has
thrown an NFL-high nine interceptions and ranks 27th in the league with
a 71.6 passer rating.
“I think when I look at Alex,
obviously to me, I’m convinced that there’s something there,” Singletary said. “That
I feel that he can be a good quarterback. But it’s up to him, at some point in
time. You’re always a work in progress, but at some point in time you have to
grab hold of it and really come to that point to where you know and everybody
else around you, that this guy has arrived. This guy can play at the NFL
position of quarterback and do a good job and lead a team to the playoffs, help
a team win the division. I do believe that Alex Smith has all of the tools, all
of the things that (he needs) to be that guy. I just need to see all of it.”
Comments are closed.