Not too long ago, the San Francisco 49ers were hoping that a hotshot prospect out of a small school named Trey Lance would be their quarterback of the future. A year after they blew a fourth-quarter lead in Super Bowl LIV, they traded three first-round draft picks and a third-rounder to the Miami Dolphins for the No. 3 pick in the 2021 draft, which they used on Lance.

He had played at North Dakota State, a school that competes in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) of the NCAA's Division I. He led the school to a national championship as a sophomore, and the 49ers saw enough in him to make him the heir apparent to Jimmy Garoppolo, who was proving he was nothing more than a game manager.

But Lance didn't pan out, while Brock Purdy, the last player chosen in the 2022 draft, came ou

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