Brock Purdy’s rise keeps picking up steam, and now the praise is coming from outside the Bay Area in a big way.
Bleacher Report’s Brad Gagnon put the San Francisco 49ers quarterback at No. 6 on his list of the NFL’s true franchise players heading into the 2026 season. That makes Purdy the third-highest quarterback on the board, trailing only Drake Maye and Jayden Daniels.
The ranking was built around young players, age 28 or under, who a team can build around regardless of what’s happening around them. It also only included players who are still with the team that drafted them. Purdy fits that profile cleanly, and his production is doing most of the talking.
Among 270 quarterbacks in NFL history with 1,000 attempts, Purdy owns the best career rating at 104.0. There’s no denying he has benefited from early-career shock factor and Kyle Shanahan’s system in a loaded offense, but the numbers are still the numbers, and his are elite.
His 2025 season only strengthened the case. Purdy was the league’s highest-rated passer on third down and was lights-out in the fourth quarter of one-score games.
On Gagnon’s overall list, Purdy finished behind Jacksonville’s Trevor Lawrence, the Chargers’ Justin Herbert and Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts. He was just ahead of Green Bay’s Jordan Love, who came in at No. 7 and was the only other quarterback to make the top 10.
The 49ers have spent the offseason reshaping the offense around Purdy, adding Mike Evans while keeping Christian McCaffrey and eventually George Kittle. That leaves him entering 2026 with as much talent around him as he’s had at any point in his career.
Gagnon’s ranking says plenty about how Purdy is viewed beyond San Francisco: the belief that he’s the 49ers’ long-term answer at quarterback is only getting stronger.
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