Should we read into why C.J. Beathard didn’t play?

We’ll be digging into the San Francisco 49ers roster all week as August 31 approaches; the date NFL teams have to cut their roster down from 90 to 53 players. For the 49ers, there will be many difficult decisions to make. One of them will be the most critical position in football, quarterback.

Out of nowhere during his postgame, head coach Kyle Shanahan said that he planned to keep all three quarterbacks on the roster. He was adamant that the 49ers “have three NFL quarterbacks.” He kept repeating it.

“We have three very good quarterbacks. We plan on having three this year. Just like every other person on our roster, if someone thinks there’s a way to upgrade our team, we’ll always listen.”

There’s no mystery here. If Shanahan keeps his word, and another team is interested in Nick Mullens or C.J. Beathard, they are going to have to give up a draft pick or a player for one of the two. They won’t be available on the waiver wire.

Shanahan didn’t stop there.

“We’re not ever going to just get rid of NFL players. And I know we’ve got three NFL quarterbacks. They’re not easy to come by, regardless of where you draft them or anything. When you have that, you don’t just give that away. Sometimes that takes years to find.”

Is that Shanahan’s way of telling us that a Day 3 pick won’t be enough? We’ll find out soon enough.

On Beathard, he didn’t play a single snap against the Chiefs Saturday night. Wilton Speight played five snaps. If we made a poll involving who the backup should be between Mullens or Beathard, at worst, Mullens would win 90/10. Shanahan continues to go out of his way to tell us that the competition is yet to be settled, despite Beathard not stepping onto the field Week 3. Shanahan did say, “Nick was up this week, and I expect C.J. to be the fourth game.”

As we try to make sense of not naming Mullens as the backup, this could the head coaches way of letting other teams know that he thinks the two are equal. We’ve seen crazy trades and signings every year in the NFL. Shanahan going out of his way to say he plans to keep three quarterbacks has to mean something.