When New York Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart suffered a serious knee injury on Monday night, we knew one of the usual suspects in sports media would call for the team to sign – who else? – Colin Kaepernick.
They do it every time a team loses its starting quarterback.
The question was who would make the claim first. The list of candidates included, but was not limited to, Jemele Hill, Dan Le Batard, Mike Florio, Mina Kimes, Stephen A. Smith, Mark Jones and Bomani Jones.
Mike Florio is the winner.
On Wednesday, the far-left sports blogger suggested the Giants bring in Kaepernick.
“With the Giants now desperate for quarterback help — and with Jake Haener and Brandon Allen as the most viable options behind new starter Jameis Winston — why not bring Kaepernick in for a look?” Florio wrote.
Florio tried arguing that Kaepernick would be a natural fit for the Giants’ offense.
“Harbaugh’s New York staff includes Greg Roman, who was the offensive coordinator during Kaepernick’s first four years in San Francisco. It would be easy, in theory, to configure the offense to fit Kaepernick. If Kaepernick still has the skills he had when he last played,” he continued.
Although Florio acknowledged that Kaepernick might not impress during a workout, he concluded that “there’s no reason not to give it a whirl.”
We disagree.
5 TOUGH QUESTIONS COLIN KAEPERNICK DIDN’T HEAR DURING HIS MEDIA TOUR | MATT CALKINS
There are multiple reasons not to give Kaepernick a “whirl,” as
Florio put it.
For one, it would be a waste of time. It is Week 3. The Giants lost Dart for the season. Jameis Winston looked unplayable Monday night against the Rams. The team doesn’t have time to work out a quarterback for mere public-relations purposes.
And that is all trying out Kaepernick would accomplish.
Kaepernick has not played professional football in a decade. He was not particularly good the last time we saw him. In his final NFL season, 2016, he posted a 49.2 QBR and served as a backup to Blaine Gabbert.
He is now approaching age 39 with a decade’s worth of rust.
In all likelihood, no athlete could take 10 years off and immediately compete in the NFL. Kaepernick can claim that he trains every morning, but there is no substitute for playing football.
Florio’s no-harm, no-foul argument technically applies to any quarterback the Giants could work out, including players from the UFL who have far more recent playing experience than Kaepernick.
What’s more, the same downside that existed in 2017 remains today.
Any team that works out Kaepernick invites an immediate circus of scrutiny and racial hysteria. In fact, Florio says he is suggesting the Giants make the call because head coach Jim Harbaugh considered Kaepernick back in 2017.
See, the Florios and Jemele Hills of the world would not be satisfied if a team simply gave Kaepernick a look. They would instantly chastise that team as racist if it did not sign Kaepernick and hand him the starting job.
THE CRAIG CARTON SHOW–UNFILTERED, UNAPOLOGETIC AND UNMISSABLE. DOWNLOAD HIS DAILY PODCAST NOW!
As we have argued for years, Kaepernick is not out of the NFL because teams have overlooked some hidden superstar. He is out because the downside of signing him far outweighs the upside.
He is a distraction, and his play isn’t good enough to justify the attention that would follow.
Signing Kaepernick would turn the Giants into a topic not only on sports television but also on cable news. That was the case in 2017, it is even more so now.
At this point, you have to wonder what Florio’s intentions are.
Perhaps he is trying to compensate for his vulgar past by shilling the far left’s favorite athletes. Maybe he is signaling his virtue. Or perhaps his brain has been scrambled by a severe case of Trump derangement syndrome and too much social media.
In any event, Florio’s latest blog calling for the Giants to work out Kaepernick is embarrassing. It undermines his credibility and makes him look like a partisan stooge desperate for attention.
