Flag football, Kurt Warner improving 49ers QB Colin Kaepernick's touch

Jim Corbett | USA TODAY Sports

PHOENIX — With the help of a few weekend warrior receivers, it's becoming apparent that Colin Kaepernick's passing touch has improved.

Kurt Warner stumbled upon the ideal proving ground — the former Super Bowl MVP's own charity flag football tournament in Arizona this month — for his rocket-armed San Francisco 49ers protege to show off the impressive strides he's made this offseason.

"We had some guys come out from the office playing in my corporate charity event, and there were a couple of times where I went, 'Whoa! Was that a little bit of touch I just saw?" Warner said of Kaepernick's performance while speaking at a Super Bowl 50 promotional appearance this week at the NFL's owners meeting. "Colin laughed and told me, 'We're not out here working for nothing.'

"The situation forced him to throw with a little more touch. He couldn't throw it as hard as maybe he wanted to with those corporate guys.

"So we've seen strides being made. ... He's growing and wants to get better."

Warner has helped Kaepernick try to progress as a pocket passer. In four seasons, the quarterback's completion percentage stands at 60.1%. He struggles to hit check-down options, routinely locking onto his primary receivers and failing to go deep into his progressions.

Kaepernick has spent the past 10 weeks working on balancing his throwing base, adding arc to his passes in drills with receivers like Odell Beckham, Jr. and Jarvis Landry while studying film at the EXOS training facility in Phoenix. Kaepernick has been getting classroom instruction from quarterback guru Dennis Giles and Warner, the two-time league MVP who ended his career with the Arizona Cardinals.

Due to family and NFL Network obligations, Warner was able to meet with Kaepernick once a week. But his suggestions were integral to improving his accuracy. New Niners scatback Reggie Bush has also assisted.

Warner and Giles have gotten Kaepernick to sink his hips to lower his narrow, upright throwing posture. They've also helped him re-set his feet to help him cycle through reads more effectively and loft passes over linebackers to drop the ball into tighter windows.

And it turns out, Warner couldn't have conceived a better drill than his tournament to force Kaepernick to take something off his signature blazing fastball rather than risk breaking the fingers of an inexperienced bunch of wannabes fresh from their cubicles.

"The whole key with a quarterback is make it normal, make it natural," Warner said.

"It's just a matter if that can become the norm for him as he gets back into defenses coming at him. My hope is those things will carry over."

Warner has been impressed by Kaepernick's work ethic and willingness to accept coaching. But the real test will come under blitz duress when those tweaks will either work or Kaepernick will revert to his rocket ball default setting.

Kaepernick's failure to make clutch, touch throws haunted him and the Niners when he threw incomplete three times from the Baltimore Ravens 5-yard line on San Francisco's final drive of its Super Bowl XLVII defeat. A year later, Richard Sherman caused a game-icing, end-zone interception for the Seattle Seahawks just when it appeared Kaepernick would drive the 49ers for a game-winning touchdown in the 2013 NFC Championship Game.

"Is 10 weeks enough time for you to change what you've been doing your entire career? And what does that look like when bullets are flying and people are attacking you?" Warner asked. "Have we gone far enough where that becomes the norm for Colin?

"That's the big question none of us can answer. ... You talk about a guy who has been playing the position one way for twenty-something years, and we're (trying) to change him in three months?

"The biggest thing with Colin is we tried to engage his lower half. Because if you can engage your lower body as a quarterback, you don't have to throw the ball 100 miles per hour with your arm. That's where touch develops."

Kaepernick struggled last season when former coach Jim Harbaugh heaped more pocket-based responsibility on the dual-threat quarterback. But new coach Jim Tomsula is hoping Warner can spark a turnaround.

"One of the biggest things I was excited about with Colin going down there was him spending some time with Kurt Warner," Tomsula said. "That's not as much on the field as it is just a mental approach to the game. Not that I have any problem with Colin. I think Colin does a great job. ... But you're talking about a (future) Hall of Famer.

"You're talking about the best in the business, one of the best there was at the position. So Colin getting to spend time with that guy, I was really excited about."

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Follow Jim Corbett on Twitter @ByJimCorbett