San Francisco 49ers quarterback Nick Mullens had his worst outing during Sunday's loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers when he went 18-of-32 for 221 yards with a touchdown, two interceptions, and a passer rating of 62.1.
Mullens has seen his passer rating and completion percentage steadily drop since his impressive NFL debut against the Oakland Raiders on November 1. He has thrown two interceptions in each of his last two starts since then after throwing none against Oakland.
Mullens' latest outing forced one reporter to question head coach Kyle Shanahan about a potential change at quarterback following the embarrassing 27-9 defeat.
"I evaluate [the quarterback position] every week, so there's no difference with that," Shanahan responded. "I'll continue to do that with every position over the next five weeks."
Shanahan said he didn't feel Mullens played very well against the Buccaneers.
"But that wasn't all him," he added. "No one played well, especially in the pass game."
Mullens will start on Sunday against the Seattle Seahawks, Shanahan announced on Monday. The head coach's comments on Sunday don't mean he will be quick to pull Mullens should the quarterback struggle.
Shanahan is scheduled to speak with reporters around 1 p.m. but joined KNBR in the morning to clarify his thoughts on the quarterback situation moving forward. Could fans see C.J. Beathard make another start?
"You could possibly see [Beathard] at all times," Shanahan said on the "Murph & Mac" show. "I know they asked me that question earlier in the week and I think my words sounded more like it was different this week. It's not.
"Nick's going into this game. We're down to our second and third quarterback. I tried to make it clear, everybody knows, Jimmy Garoppolo is our quarterback. Going into it each week, we're just going to see what gives us the best chance to win.
"Nick got all the reps in practice. He's going to go out there. It wasn't his fault what happened in Tampa. It was everyone's fault. No one played well, I thought, offensively. Even some of our best players who have been most consistent all year. I think we had our worst game offensively. Nick didn't do well either, but that's not enough to say it was his fault and bench him.
"We're going into this game, we'll let him play. It's not as if he throws one pick, you're going to sit there and make a change. I would say no on (Mullens being on) a short leash, but if we're struggling anyway, and if we ever felt that C.J. gave us a better chance at the time, I would do that. That's exactly what I would have done last week versus Tampa, and it's what I would have done versus the Giants also."
You can listen to the entire conversation with Shanahan below.
