Many in the football were shocked when news emerged Monday night that the New England Patriots had traded backup gunslinger Jimmy Garoppolo to the San Francisco 49ers for a second-round draft pick in 2018.
Coach Bill Belichick confirmed the trade Tuesday on a conference call with the media.
“I have a tremendous amount of respect for Jimmy,”
Patriots coach Bill Belichick said. “I couldn’t ask for him to give us any more than he’s given us. The 49ers are getting a good player, and they’re getting a good person and they’re getting a great teammate. And they’re getting a good quarterback. And Jimmy’s getting a good coach. His career is moving forward. He’s a talented individual. He was a great person to coach. I met with him weekly, and again I have a tremendous amount of respect for him. But as his career moves forward we have to look to our team, both this year and beyond.”
Belichick did not get into the specifics of the trade, but did say he felt like he “had to make a decision” on Garoppolo’s future.
“We had probably had, in my opinion, the best quarterback situation in the league for the last, call it 2½ years,” Belichick said. “It’s just not sustainable given the way that things are set up. It’s definitely not something that we wanted to walk away from and I felt like we rode it out as long as we could. We, over a period of time, explored every option possible to try and sustain it. But at this point felt like we had to make a decision.”
Belichick did not offer any insight on who the team plans to replace Garoppolo with.
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