Kezar stadium practice recap: 49ers first and only open practice

The San Francisco 49ers traveled to the city for their first and only open practice at the historic Kezar Stadium. There was a nice turnout attending the festivities considering it was held on a weekday. Practice was run in the same fashion as every other practice, only the venue had changed.

Team warm ups, position warm ups and then special teams play kicked off the afternoon. One of the highlights of the day were the long booming kicks made by Bradley Pinion that sailed well beyond 60 yards. He has hasn’t had that type of distance on the practice field consistently. Maybe he just needed an audience.

It wasn’t a good day for the QBs. Due to time constraints I had to leave practice before all of the team drills had concluded, but what I did see and looking at the recaps from the other beat writers, I didn’t miss very much. Colin Kaepernick went 2/6 during 7-on-7 drills where three of the four incomplete passes went out of bounds. In the next series, Blaine Gabbert went 2/5 with his final pass nearly intercepted by rookie Rashard Robinson.

The one play that did get the crowd going during one 11-on-11 series was a designed run play with Kaepernick at QB. A hole opened up to his right and the crowd let out it’s biggest cheers of the day. Kaepernick was actually the fan favorite of the day. He received the loudest cheers when he entered the stadium and also as he raised his clenched fist for the fans trying to get his attention during warm ups.

HOFer Charles Haley traveled with he team to Kezar and worked with the DL on various drills including this one that worked OL vs. DL:

It was Ray Ray Armstrong’s day to play inside next to Bowman. As in the QB race, there has yet to be someone to really make a case for being the starter. Things may become more clear as the Texans join the 49ers for practice on Friday before their first preseason game on Sunday.