49ers Likely to Say No to Mark Sanchez

The Super Bowl is in the books and the Pro Bowl is a couple days off, but after that, it'll be six months until we see another NFL game. In the meantime, there's the offseason, which means that we'll be subjected to millions of mock drafts, pretty much all of which will be rendered meaningless as soon as they're published. (Exception: FanHouse's mock draft. Naturally.)

Doesn't mean we won't read them, just pointing out that, more than anything, mock drafts are a way to pass the time between the end of the NFL season and the start of training camp.

And understanding that helps explain this: a few days ago, ESPN's Todd McShay had the 49ers taking USC quarterback Mark Sanchez with the 10th-overall pick. In light of that, Matt Barrows of the Sacramento Bee's 49ers Blog makes a pretty important point:

I don't see Sanchez landing in San Francisco for several reasons, one is that the 49ers are still fond of another Top 10 Top 1 quarterback, Alex Smith. If Smith, as expected, returns to the 49ers, it's hard to see the 49ers going out on a limb for another junior QB.

I have a soft spot for Smith, even though some 49ers fans are ready to be done with the guy. He'll have to take a pay cut to stay in San Francisco, but -- and this is a crazy notion, I know -- maybe some stability will actually help his career. There's also this, though: a lot of draft nerds are down on this year's quarterback draft class. Matt Stafford has all the physical tools, but he's probably not a first-overall-pick type talent (see '05 draft for how that could work out).

After Stafford there's Sanchez, but there's a decent chance -- at least from the perspective of early February -- that he falls out of the first round altogether. (Pete Carroll certainly hops so.)

To McShay's credit, he has since changed the pick from Sanchez to Missouri wide receiver Jeremy Maclin, who would fill an obvious need in an offense desperately lacking a downfield threat. Plus, as Barrows mentions above, it would mean the front office wouldn't have to go through the experience of drafting another junior quarterback, making him the face of the franchise, and subsequently watching it explode in their faces.