Joel Klatt shares Coach Harbaugh and Gattis’ planning when it comes to Cade and JJ on the Rich Eisen Show

This is a great interview where Eisen and Klatt discuss the upcoming game vs MSU. If you pick up the video at 4:39 or so, Eisen makes that point that many on this blog have made – that Cade has done a really good job, has made very few mistakes, but seems to have a limited upside. He then asks Klatt if he has asked Harbaugh about what his plans are for QB moving forward. Klatt responds that YES, he has spoken about this with Harbaugh and Gattis and then paraphrases what they said.

My transcript of the relevant portion of the video is below.

Klatt:

“Let me put it to you this way and I’m going to paraphrase what they (Harbaugh and Gattis) say. And these are my words, not theirs. But I’m going to paraphrase what they say. They would not be 7-0 without Cade McNamara being their starting QB. There’s a good chance they can’t get to 12-0 or 11-1 without JJ McCarthy playing a more significant role or even being their starting quarterback moving forward. OK, so if you start to think about this, and I think that they had a long view to begin the season, where they know, like, listen – in order to give ourselves the best chance to win, Cade’s got to play. He’s not going to turn the ball over, we know we’re very good up front on our offensive line, we got these two great backs, and we’re just going to be able to bludgeon people to death really, and win games. Now if we can get through Wisconsin on the road or Nebraska on the road, And we can win those games, we’re going to set ourselves up for a chance to make a run here late in the season – late October and November.

Now having said that, rather than just put all their chips in that basket, they understand that Cade McNamara probably has a lid or a ceiling to where he can take the offense. I wouldn’t categorize him as an above the X’s and O’s player. Here’s how I would put it. They don’t have a wide receiver that takes Cade’s game to the next level and Cade doesn’t take any of their wide receiver’s games to the next level.  JJ does, potentially, but he’s the unbroken colt that you get on, but you just don’t know. You don’t want him to buck you off against Wisconsin or Washington early in the season and lose you a game with a poor interception or a mistake, but at the same time you know that that ceiling that Cade has on this offense may need to be ratcheted up, and that lid may need to come off of that offense at some point down the stretch. Maybe it’s this week.

So they played him (JJ), and it wasn’t just small packages – they gave him the offense and would allow him to play in big moments and shuttle him in at times. And now, if and when they need to go to JJ McCarthy, he’s not an unknown commodity. They’re not, quote, “replacing the quarterback”, they’re just giving him an expanded role within the offense. I think it’s very smart of them, they understand what they’re going to need here in the back half of the season and I think they’re more prepared to answer some of those questions if and when they arise, than maybe they have been in the past.”

So it sounds like the coaches see things similarly to how many of us on the blog do – Cade has a high floor, but a lower ceiling. And the coaches chose to go with Cade to start the season because they didn’t need a super high ceiling to start the year and could use that time to continue getting JJ up to speed and ready to take the reins. It sounds like the coaches are riding with Cade as the starter until we play a team where we need the higher ceiling in order to have the best chance to win. And then it’s time to unleash JJ.