A perfect match? Jimmy Garoppolo and the Bay Area's instant embrace
It took all of about one minute and seven seconds last season for a large number of Bay Area fans to embrace San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo.
That's how long it took for Garoppolo to enter the game against the Seattle Seahawks, run for 4 yards, complete a pass for 8 and then evade pressure to throw his first touchdown as a 49er, a 10-yard strike to Louis Murphy.
Now, he’s got a snow leopard named after him.nfl cheap jerseys free shipping
That three-play sequence on Nov. 26, 2017 capped an 11-point defeat. That part, the Niners’ 10th loss of the season anyway, is mostly inconsequential. But Garoppolo's quick cameo immediately gave Niners fans something they desperately craved: Hope. Hope that the 49ers were on the path back to respectability and that Garoppolo would be the guy to end the team's nearly two-decade search for another franchise quarterback.
In the ensuing months, the Bay Area's love for Garoppolo has been readily apparent despite Garoppolo's attempts to maintain a low profile. And now that Garoppolo has had time to do something other than bury his head in a 49ers playbook, he's taking advantage of the chance to return the love to his new home.
"It’s exciting," Garoppolo said. "… (I'm) really getting to know certain areas of the Bay a lot better. It’s cool. I never got to do that last year. I was pretty much (at the facility) 24 hours a day. It’s nice to get out and experience some of it."
After replacing C.J. Beathard as the starter in December, Garoppolo led the Niners to five straight wins to close last season. That was enough for the Niners to show Garoppolo how much they care about him, in the form of a five-year, $137.5 million contract in February.
The Bay Area's instant love for Garoppolo can be seen and experienced in myriad ways, big and small, from San Francisco to San Jose and points in between. It's also grown exponentially, considering all that's happened since he took his first snap with the team.authentic stitched nfl jerseys cheap
To wit, within Garoppolo's first month as the starter, La Rocca's Corner Bar in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco began advertising that Garoppolo would be at their bar looking for a date, a clever effort to capitalize on both Garoppolo's burgeoning popularity and his movie star good looks.
