He's a fourth-year starting quarterback in the NFL who led his team to three consecutive NFC Championship Games and one Super Bowl appearance.
For all his efforts, he is ranked behind an incoming, non-quarterback rookie in a list of the league's most influential people.
MMQB.SI.com ranks Colin Kaepernick as the No. 72 Most Influential Person in the NFL, which includes NFL and college players, coaches, executives and members of the media. The ranking, therefore, doesn't seem so bad considering the step back he took in 2014. His offseason workouts and transformed mechanics have several people in the San Francisco 49ers organization salivating at his potential in 2015, and experts seem to agree that he will be improved, but he has yet to prove his newfound skills in an actual game.
But does that mean he should be ranked lower than a rookie just entering the league? MMQB thinks so.
And the rookie isn't even the No. 1 pick, but rather the No. 10 choice who is entering the season with questions about the health of his knee.
Listed at No. 71 is St. Louis Rams running back Todd Gurley.
According to MMQB, "It's hard to believe the two-year drought without a running back drafted in the first round ended with a player five months removed from ACL surgery. But that's the kind of talent Todd Gurley is. The combination of power and speed he showed during three seasons at Georgia led some NFL evaluators to proclaim him the best thing to come out of a college backfield since Adrian Peterson-and convinced the Rams to rank him No. 1 overall on their draft board."
MMQB's prevailing sentiment is that Kaepernick's previous regression, along with the pressure to improve now that the 49ers have signed deep-threat wide receiver Torrey Smith and pass-catching running back Reggie Bush put the quarterback at greater risk.
If he doesn't improve this year, Kaepernick conceivably could find himself out of a job in 2016, thanks to the team-friendly contract he signed before start of the 2014 season.
Do you think Colin Kaepernick should be ranked higher than St. Louis Rams rookie running back Todd Gurley among a list of the NFL's most influential people? Comment below or tell us @SportsWN.
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