How 49ers’ George Kittle and Trey Lance are using offseason to improve chemistry

Tight end George Kittle has consistently praised his San Francisco 49ers teammate, Trey Lance, this offseason. The quarterback entered last season as the team’s starter, but a Week 2 ankle injury ended that. It paved the way for Jimmy Garoppolo and, eventually, Brock Purdy to take over the starting job.

With Purdy sidelined after undergoing March 10 UCL surgery, Lance made the most of his opportunity, competing with free-agent acquisition Sam Darnold for the QB2 spot.

Kittle believes the offseason work, both on the field and in the classroom, has greatly benefited his 23-year-old quarterback.

“Trey has been great,” Kittle recently told Jennifer Lee Chan of NBC Sports Bay Area at Tight End University in Nashville, Tennessee. “I think he took steps forward in the OTAs. It’s really fun when you start connecting on plays that you might have struggled [with] in the past, and that’s something that we did at OTAs a couple of times, so that was fun. Got to get a lot of extra work in with them.”

For the third year in a row, Tight End University brought together tight ends around the NFL to learn from each other and improve their skills. Kittle helped found the annual event, along with Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs and NFL tight end turned sportscaster Greg Olsen.

Kittle is eager to build the same kind of chemistry Kelce has enjoyed with his All-Pro quarterback, Patrick Mahomes.

“I just like taking ball with [Lance], too, because one of the things that Kelce was saying about him and Patrick is just they communicate about certain things, and there’s talk through everything,” Kittle shared. “So as long as they’re on the same page, it doesn’t really matter what the defense does. You can find that spot, or he’s going to know what Travis is going to do on any given play because they’ve repped so many times, they’ve talked about it so many times.

“So just having that opportunity to sit down and talk with Trey, watch film with him, and having this event, too, because Trey sat next to me through our meetings. For him to be able to watch guys talk about routes and stuff like that, to see how other tight ends are talking about it, he learns stuff from that, too. So it’s just a fun opportunity for him.”