The fate of the 49ers year is now in Mac Jones' hands. They're f-ked.

There is a rational way to confront the reality of Mac Jones, so let’s do that before I encourage you to go completely bugf—k about what’s happening to your 49ers right now. The team’s franchise quarterback, Brock Purdy, is now expected to miss at least two weeks, and likely more, thanks to a case of the dreaded turf toe. But San Francisco is still 1-0, the season is barely out of the delivery room, and the early part of the schedule remains favorable. That last part rings especially true when you consider that the New Orleans Saints — the 49ers’ Week 2 opponent — operate more as an abuse laundering front for the Catholic Church than as a competitive football concern. This is a survivable injury. The 49ers can still compete, and almost certainly will.

Now let’s talk about how f—ked you are.

To do this, we have to go all the way back to the spring of 2021, when Nazi insurrections were still thought of as bad, “AI” was just a Spielberg movie that film dorks liked to argue about, and the development of COVID-19 vaccines was something that virtually all Americans celebrated. A more innocent time, to be certain.

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Here in San Francisco, that cherished innocence promised to come in the corporeal form of a rookie quarterback. Prior to that April’s draft, 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan traded the farm to move up to the No. 3 overall pick, and then allowed himself a playful snicker as the football press convinced itself that Shanahan would draft Alabama QB Mac Jones at that spot instead of North Dakota State prospect Trey Lance. Shanahan later revealed that he viewed both players favorably. But he took Lance, who promptly sucked. The Patriots took Jones, who looked respectable for one season before also sucking. Neither QB would serve out their rookie contract with the teams that drafted them.

So now here’s Jones to play mop-up duty while Purdy — whose lack of size will always leave him more prone to injury than his larger contemporaries — heals up his little piggies. Jones served in a similar capacity for Jacksonville a year ago, when Jaguars starter Trevor Lawrence suffered a handful of Trevor Lawrence-ish injuries. Jones played in 10 games for the Jags last season. He won only two of them, both against the Tennessee Titans. The Jags averaged just over 15 points per game over that span.

Those are some ominous facts when you consider the 49ers’ broader issues at the moment. Shanahan just fired kicker Jake Moody for being less accurate than a toddler playing Skee-Ball. Tight end George Kittle just landed on injured reserve. Running back Christian McCaffrey is nursing a calf injury that he pinky swears isn’t serious, which means he’s a week away from flying to Germany to get elephant stem cells injected into the afflicted area. Wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk is still trying to come back from tearing his ACL a season ago. And Aiyuk’s replacement, Jauan Jennings, is both hurt AND disgruntled, just as Aiyuk was this time last year. This is the offense that Mac Jones, whose signature win came in a game where he threw a grand total of three passes, will be manning come Sunday.

With all of that in mind, there are only two reasons to believe that the 49ers aren’t screwed. The first is the aforementioned schedule, which consists of 100% NFL teams and does not include Rutgers. The second is that Kyle Shanahan is the best coach in the business. That’s only true if you don’t factor in Shanny’s just above .500 career record, his lack of Super Bowl victories, his unyielding determination to get his own players hurt, and the fact that he never met a 10-point lead he wasn’t eager to squander. So these are not good arguments in the face of reality, which looks like this:

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That is not the face of a winner. That is the face of a boy who’s far too old to be working a lemonade stand. I’ll always appreciate Mac Jones for assisting in the decline of Bill Belichick. But he turned out to be a dud while he was with the Pats, and was even less impressive serving as a relief pitcher for the Jaguars. Do you, a knowledgeable 49ers fan, really want me to talk you into Shanny magically turning this pud into some kind of play-action terminator? What favor am I doing getting your hopes up like that? I’m a Vikings fan, so I know how futile such unfounded hopes can be. I just got excited over a win against the Bears, for Christ’s sake. The Bears! I may as well believe in the goddamn tooth fairy.

Thus, it’s my sworn duty to tell you that you’re completely screwed. You have no hope. Any pass that Lil Mac completes past the line of scrimmage will be a miracle. Every win that he ekes out against an underwhelming opponent won’t feel like a win at all. And every loss will be excruciating to watch, even more so than the wins. Worst of all, I can all but guarantee you’ll see more of him this season than you’ve already been warned. Despite its goofy name, turf toe is a serious injury and Brock Purdy, despite the team’s $181 million investment in him this offseason, is about as durable as a Netgear router. Mac Jones is your daddy now, and probably for longer than you’d prefer.

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The good news is that hey, maybe you’ll suck so bad that your coach can trick everyone into believing he’s gonna draft Arch Manning seven months from now.

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