Every offseason for the next several years, there is a contractual trapdoor under Colin Kaepernick – and perhaps now we know why. Maybe the San Francisco 49ers were always hedging against what is happening now, protecting against a potential unraveling of the star quarterback they leaned upon so heavily.

NFL contracts are cruel that way. They're naked and unemotional. There is a finite bluntness in their raw numbers and guarantees. Sometimes the digits and clauses say things that a coaching staff can't or a front office won't. And looking back at the $126 million extension Kaepernick signed in 2014, it's fair to wonder how certain the franchise was in his development. The 49ers built a whole lot of exits into his deal with very little "real" guaranteed money from one season to the next. Concisely, San Francisco has an opportunity (multiple, actually) to cut the cord with Kaepernick in the coming offseasons. That means if his current decline continues, you have to wonder if the 49ers will take that opportunity sooner rather than later.

View photos Colin Kaepernick hasn't thrown a TD pass in the past two games. (Getty Images) More

Is this hindsight quarterbacking just four games into the season? Sure. But the time is right for it, with Kaepernick seemingly on a weekly slide that takes him further from the player who nearly led the 49ers to a Super Bowl win following the 2013 NFL season. The 49ers have lost three straight to the Pittsburgh Steelers, Arizona Cardinals and Green Bay Packers by a combined score of 107-28. In the past two horrific games, he has gone 22 for 44 for 227 yards and five interceptions with zero touchdowns. (If you want to throw in his 103 rushing yards with a touchdown as a redeemer, that's your prerogative.) NFL Films' Greg Cosell did a spectacular job of spelling out some of the problems recently.

The bottom line is exactly that – the bottom line. It keeps going lower for Kaepernick, and there are fewer things to blame beyond the quarterback. Strictly from the eyeball test, he has gone through a steady journey to the middle since that Super Bowl. The middle might actually be an improvement. He'll enter Week 5 among the lowest rated quarterbacks in the NFL. And it's not like he fell off a cliff over night, either.

In 2014, it was the Jim Harbaugh fallout and awkwardness that supposedly weighed on the whole franchise. Or it was the supporting cast. Michael Crabtree couldn't get separation at the medium or deep level. Maybe Anquan Boldin's age was starting to show. His defenders suggested that could be why Kaepernick's deep ball accuracy faded. Or he wasn't 100 percent healthy. Or the offense hadn't evolved to stave off changes from defensive schemes.

Now? The offensive line (which was intact during last season's struggles) isn't as good as it was a year ago. The free-agent addition, Torrey Smith (billed as a perfect match for Kaepernick's arm), is too one-dimensional. The running game is banged up and inconsistent. Boldin hit a wall. Vernon Davis can't play anymore. It goes on and on.

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