Fooch's Note: On these questions, we're looking for things we can answer by the end of training camp. Questions about game plan and things that will be answered in the regular season are going to be tough to answer by the end of training camp.
The San Francisco 49ers welcome back most of their veterans on Wednesday, and will conduct their first practice of training camp Thursday afternoon. The next six weeks (combined with what the team saw through the offseason workout program) will determine the 53-man roster.
Figuring out the roster is the big over-arching question, but there are plenty of questions that will actually answer that. It reminds me of Dr. Barbay's questions from Back To School. "I have only one question for Mr. Mellon....in 27 parts."
As camp approaches, each of the beat writers is putting together a look at some of the biggest storylines and questions. Cam Inman, Grant Cohn, and Bill Williamson have all posted their questions and storylines, and more will come along soon.
In the meantime, I had an idea for a little group project here at Niners Nation. I want to come up with a crowd-sourced list of questions we want to answer between now and the end of training camp. I could come up with them on my own, but what fun is that? And yes, it does make my life just a little bit easier when I crowd-source this kind of thing.
The plan will be to come up with as many questions as we possibly can. This is not something where we have 90 questions covering 90 players, but rather, we dig a little deeper using it to flesh out position battles, and what we can expect heading into the 2014 season. I'll start things off with some questions that I am most interested in. After that, drop your questions in the comments. You can discuss the questions I'm posting, but if you want to include questions of your own, do those as separate comments.
So, we'll have comments just listing questions (and adding any context if needed), and separate comments for those wanting to discuss the questions any of us bring up. For your questions, feel free to get creative beyond just basic position battles and roster spots. For now, here are some of my questions.
1. When will Alex Boone and Vernon Davis show up?
2. Where will Tank Carradine line up in the depth chart?
3. Will Chris Culliver or Chris Cook claim the starting job opposite Tramaine Brock?
4. Will Darryl Morris and Jimmie Ward show enough to justify cutting Perrish Cox before the start of the season?
5. How soon until Marcus Lattimore is off the NFI list and participating in game action?
6. Will Joe Looney or Adam Snyder emerge behind Alex Boone at RG (and thus in his place if he continues his holdout)?
7. Who claims the ILB job next to Patrick Willis?
8. Can Brandon Lloyd do enough to earn a roster spot?
9. Any word on Aldon Smith's suspension?
10. Will Stevie Johnson be healthy for the start of the season?
Those are just ten quick questions. You can drop in your own that could be questions we answer on day one of camp, questions we can answer after the first preseason game, or questions we won't be able to answer until early September. Drop them in the comments, and I'll put together an all-encompassing list.