Why Mike Evans is a kind of weapon Brock Purdy, 49ers have never had

If Mike Evans didn’t seem like such a chill dude, he sure would be scary.Six feet, five inches and 231 pounds of pretty much pure muscle.Some of it covered in Harry Potter tattoos, an illustration of his well-known obsession with the magical J.K.

Rowling series. But opposing cornerbacks don’t get to see that side of him.It’s not that they don’t get a good view.Take Jaylen Watson, for example.The Rams corner lined up opposite Evans on third down at the Los Angeles 2-yard line, with the 49ers at risk of having to settle for three points on an otherwise methodical march down the field coming out of halftime, still leading only 10-7.If Kyle Shanahan has learned anything from matching up with Evans over the previous 12 years of his career, he should know the future Hall-of-Fame receiver wasn’t going to let that happen.“We’ve watched Mike do that for his whole career,” he said.

“Just never been on the team with him.… I love calling plays for Mike.”Watson, a respectable 6-foot-2, initiated contact at the line of scrimmage and never let up as Evans ran a fade route into the corner of the end zone.

There was just 0.8 yards of separation between Brock Purdy’s intended target and the defender face-guarding him, according to the NFL’s Next Gen Stats.He threw it up to him, anyway.The 49ers walked away with seven points and a 17-7 lead, and they never looked back on their way to a convincing 27-7 season-opening win.For Evans, it was the 109th touchdown of his career — two away from tying Tony Gonzalez for ninth all-time — and his first with any team besides the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The pass from Purdy had a 22.5% chance of ending in a completion, per Next Gen Stats.

But he put it in the air with 100% confidence Evans would come down with it.He had his reasons.As left tackle Trent Williams put it, “He’s a jump ball extraordinaire.” (Moments before that, the future inductee in Canton, Ohio, gave Evans another moniker: “Hall of Fame Mike...