Nevius: Performance, not politics, is costing Kaepernick

This week President Donald Trump bragged that he is the reason free agent quarterback Colin Kaepernick hasn’t signed with an NFL team.

Ridiculous.

Now, this isn’t the place for Trump commentary. For that you can go to … well, almost any other page of the newspaper.

But his comments feed into the red (white and blue) herring that says Kaepernick is out of work because he refused to stand for the national anthem. The narrative is that the NFL has such lofty moral standards that no team will risk signing a player with that sort of baggage.

Seriously?

These are the NFL teams who are right now attempting to come up with a justification to draft Oklahoma running back Joe Mixon, who can be seen in a 2014 video punching a woman so viciously that he broke her jaw. Spoiler alert: He’s going to be drafted, and probably in the early rounds.

This is the league commissioner - Roger Goodell - who, after Baltimore running back Ray Rice knocked his girlfriend unconscious in 2014, ruled that he should serve a mere two-game suspension. (Goodell increased it to “indefinite” after a horrifying video of Rice’s assault appeared.)

This is a league that last year drafted offensive lineman Laremy Tunsil in the first round, despite a video appearing to show him smoking marijuana while wearing a gas mask for a maximum high.

Next to those examples, Kaepernick doesn’t look like such a menace to society. He’s even made compassionate donations to Meals on Wheels and drought-plagued Somalia.

Remember, for all the cries of how his protest was shredding the very fabric of society, it wasn’t until the third preseason game that anyone even noticed he was doing it.

And by the way, where do we draw the line? I was once at a high school football games where a guy had the hat knocked off his head because he didn’t take it off during the anthem. Are we going to enforce that at Levi’s Stadium? What about putting your hand over your heart? You’re supposed to do that, too. If you don’t, should you be removed from the stadium?

I don’t know what NFL teams are thinking about Kaepernick, but I can tell you what I think and I’ll bet many teams feel the same way.

I don’t care if Kaepernick sits, kneels, stands or does jumping jacks during the anthem.

I want to see him complete a 12-yard out. For a first down. Consistently.

That’s not happening.

You can pick your favorite metric, but they all make the same point - when it comes to passing accuracy and production, Kaepernick isn’t in the top 20.

There’s no shame in that. There are millions of people who can’t play quarterback.

Every year hundreds of college quarterbacks - first, second and third string - take the field, hopeful of making their mark. How many of them even get drafted into the NFL? Ten? And how many of those make it? Not many.

Playing quarterback in the NFL is the most difficult job in professional sports. You have to throw 30 yards with pinpoint accuracy, read defenses on the fly, and get rid of the ball before big, angry men knock you flat.

Kaepernick hasn’t done that.

Still, for years, the 49ers have persisted that improvement is just around the corner.

Kaepernick went to summer quarterback camp with Kurt Warner and returned with a whole new throwing motion. They were going to tailor the offense to his skills. He’s getting better at reading the field, we’re told.

And yet, still not in the top 20.

The 49ers’ version of “waiting for Colin” has made “Waiting for Godot” look like a light-hearted tale of joyful reunions.

C’mon. He’ll be 30 in November. He’s entering his seventh year in the NFL. If he’s going to turn it around, we should have seen it by now.

Loyal fans defend Kaepernick because of his signature scrambles. When protection breaks down he takes off, sometimes running for long first downs or even touchdowns.

It’s very exciting. Unfortunately, it is not an offense.

An NFL offense is crafted by sophisticated deep thinkers who create precise patterns for 11 men to move in unison. Players run complicated routes to create a moment in time when a receiver pops open in space. At that exact second, the quarterback has to deliver a ball into the receiver’s hands.

Kaepernick doesn’t do that consistently. And that’s the job description.

Now, is there a chance he’ll get it together, find a team and a coach that can make the most of him? Sure. He may prove everyone wrong. What a laugh he will have on those of us who doubted him.

But he’s had his shot with the 49ers.

Teams are looking at his body of work and doubting he can play quarterback in the NFL.

If they thought he could, they’d sign him - regardless of the anthem protest.

Press Democrat sports columnist C.W. Nevius can be reached at cwnevius@pressdemocrat.com. Follow him on Twitter @cwnevius.