It's no secret that San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick has regressed this season. The fourth-year passer is on pace for a career low in QBR (52.2) and zero rushing touchdowns, which would be a first since he became the full-time starter in 2012. The 49ers are likely out of the playoff picture after back-to-back losses over the past two weeks. Head coach Jim Harbaugh is almost certainly on his way out the door as well.
All of this could mean a change in scenery for Kaepernick as well. Unlike other major contracts for quarterbacks, the 49ers signed Kaepernick to a relatively team-friendly deal with several logical outs if they should choose to move on.
"On the surface, it appeared as if the 49ers made a huge financial commitment to Kaepernick when he signed a six-year, $126 million contract extension during the offseason because of the overall value of the deal and the $61 million in guarantees," Joel Corry of National Football Post wrote. "Kaepernick's extension has a team-friendly structure, as do all of the lucrative contracts negotiated by the 49ers in recent years.
"Only $12,973,766 of the $61 million in guarantees is fully guaranteed at signing. $48,026,234 of Kaepernick's base salaries are guaranteed for injury only initially. His 2015 through 2017 base salaries and a portion of his 2018 base salary are fully guaranteed if he's on the roster on April 1 in each specific contract year (i.e. 2015 base salary becomes guaranteed on April 1, 2015).
"Kaepernick doesn't have the same level of security as other quarterbacks with comparable deals. Jay Cutler, Tony Romo and Matt Ryan have $38 million, $40 million and $42 million, respectively, practically fully guaranteed at signing in their contracts, which is essentially triple Kaepernick's amount."
San Fran's loss to the Oakland Raiders last week virtually guarantees a salary de-escalator in Kaepernick's contract that will lower his dollar amount by $2 million this season. However, that dip won't affect Kaepernick's salary cap hit of more than $15 million.
It's unlikely that the 49ers will flat out release Kaepernick after this season. He's only 27, is just two years removed from a Super Bowl appearance and still has a lot of upside.
"The 49ers would attempt to trade Kaepernick before releasing him anyway. Kaepernick is having his worst NFL season since becoming a starter and his failure to make significant strides as a pocket passer would impact the type of compensation the 49ers could get for him in a trade. It's hard to imagine the 49ers receiving a draft choice comparable to the second-round pick (36th overall) used to select him even though he still has upside as a quarterback.
"The most likely scenario is the 49ers restructuring Kaepernick's contract in the offseason because he has the highest 2015 cap number on the team ($15,265,753) and the 49ers have the third-most 2015 cap commitments in the NFL at $148.9 million (51 players under contract) while having slightly over $4.5 million of unused cap room to carry over from this year. According to multiple reports, the NFL Management Council informed teams at an NFL meeting on December 9 that the 2015 salary cap is preliminarily projected to be between $138.6 million and $141.8 million. The actual salary cap this year is 5.3 percent higher than the preliminary projections this time last year. Regardless of where it is ultimately set, the 49ers have cap issues for 2015."
A more likely scenario, as rumored previously, is that the 49ers will hire a new head coach who will tweak the offense to play to Kaepernick's mobility advantage.
