{"id":52552,"date":"2018-11-01T18:20:06","date_gmt":"2018-11-01T22:20:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lwosonnfl.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/?p=52552"},"modified":"2018-11-01T18:20:06","modified_gmt":"2018-11-01T22:20:06","slug":"nick-mullens-start-49ers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2018\/11\/01\/nick-mullens-start-49ers\/","title":{"rendered":"Nick Mullens to Start at Quarterback for San Francisco 49ers on Thursday Night Football"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Opportunity is knocking for <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cfb\/players\/nick-mullens-1.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nick Mullens<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The second-year quarterback will make his first career NFL start for the <a href=\"http:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/49ers\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">San Francisco 49ers<\/a> against their Bay Area rival <a href=\"http:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/raiders\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Oakland Raiders<\/a> on Thursday Night Football. Per ESPN&#8217;s <strong>Adam Schefter<\/strong>, he&#8217;s starting due to <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/B\/BeatC.00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">C.J. Beathard<\/a><\/strong> dealing with a wrist injury.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">San Francisco\u2019s starting QB tonight against the Oakland Raiders will be Nick Mullens, per source.  <\/p>\n<p>C.J. Beathard will serve as his backup, but with his wrist injury affecting his grip on the football, Mullens will make his first NFL start and throw his first NFL pass.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AdamSchefter\/status\/1058105700742819840?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">November 1, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h1><strong>Nick Mullens to Make First Career NFL Start on Thursday Night Football<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p>It&#8217;s just the latest development at quarterback for the 49ers during a season that&#8217;s quickly gone off the rails. The first came in Week Three when <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/G\/GaroJi00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jimmy Garoppolo<\/a><\/strong> injured his knee in the fourth quarter during a 38-27 loss to the <a href=\"http:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/chiefs\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kansas City Chiefs<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/lwosonnfl.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/2018\/10\/05\/jimmy-garoppolo-undergoes-knee-surgery-to-repair-torn-acl\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">San Fran later confirmed that he tore his ACL<\/a> and would miss the remainder of the 2018 season.<\/p>\n<p>Mullens went undrafted in 2017 and later signed with the Niners on May 5. The team cut him at the end of the preseason but later signed him to their practice squad, where he remained for the remainder of the year. Mullens was released and added to the practice squad once again this year. But after Garoppolo&#8217;s injury, San Fran promoted Mullens to their active roster.<\/p>\n<p>The product of Southern Mississippi enjoyed a rather successful collegiate career. He started all four years in Hattiesburg and went a combined 16-10 as an upperclassman. During his junior year, he tossed 38 touchdowns which were the fourth-best total in FBS that year. His 11,994 career passing yards and 87 touchdowns are both school records.<\/p>\n<p>Thursday&#8217;s matchup certainly isn&#8217;t as widely anticipated as when the schedule initially came out. Back then, it was billed as a big-time quarterback matchup between Garoppolo and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/C\/CarrDe02.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Derek Carr<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>with the former going up against a fierce defense led by talented edge rusher <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.pro-football-reference.com\/players\/M\/MackKh00.htm?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Khalil Mack<\/a><\/strong>. But first-year head coach <strong>Jon Gruden<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/lwosonnfl.ms.lastwordonsports.com\/2018\/09\/01\/khalil-mack-traded-to-chicago-bears\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">dealt the two-time All-Pro<\/a> to the <a href=\"http:\/\/lastwordonprofootball.com\/nfl-teams\/bears\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Chicago Bears<\/a> for draft picks, Garoppolo got hurt, and now these two teams come into Week Nine having won a combined two games.<\/p>\n<p>But it all gives Mullens a chance to shine on a nationally televised stage.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"95luudFrQtB4gp-rpgDXcQ\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1025421506\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'95luudFrQtB4gp-rpgDXcQ',sig:'1rJulcKCfH_HEHSca9_6fyYMN6qXdVCy1iwuZO3IpQQ=',w:'594px',h:'417px',items:'1025421506',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Nick Mullens will make his first career NFL start on Thursday with current San Francisco 49ers starting quarterback C.J. Beathard nursing a wrist injury.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":742,"featured_media":52566,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36,31],"tags":[2965,61,401,40,4380,52],"class_list":["post-52552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl-news","category-49ers","tag-c-j-beathard","tag-football","tag-jimmy-garoppolo","tag-nfl","tag-nick-mullens","tag-san-francisco-49ers"],"modified_by":"John Bava","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/742"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}