Lost in the shuffle of Miami's sixth-straight win Sunday was the fact that opposing quarterback Colin Kaepernick actually had a hell of a game.
Kaepernick was 29-of-46 passing for 296 yards, three touchdowns and one interception. He also rushed the ball 10 times for 113 yards.
Beyond the box score, he was making plays in clutch situations late in the game. Aside from the final play, which Kaepernick tucked and ran from the 6-yard line in an effort to score the game-tying touchdown only to come up two yards short, he provided the first glimmer of 2013 Kaepernick that we've seen in a long time.
"I thought Kap did a good job. The interception was a tipped ball. Other than that, I thought he did a good job protecting the ball," Chip Kelly said, via the team's official site. "His ability to keep some drives alive with his feet, I thought he did a good job there."
If nothing else, Sunday showed that, eventually, Kaepernick will get healthy enough to be serviceable quarterback in the NFL again. While he may never approach the heights he saw under Jim Harbaugh, his combination of speed and arm strength can still combine for a decent game every now and then.
Aided by some phenomenal plays by his receivers (looking at you, Jeremy Kerley), Kaepernick led the team on two second-half touchdown drives and a field goal drive. Had he broken the pocket for the end zone sooner (or had the upper body strength available to run over a Dolphins linebacker) it would have been three.
The Kelly era has produced some largely mundane football in San Francisco. As it turns out, a slower-paced version of his offense is even tougher to watch than the one he ran during his last season with the Philadelphia Eagles. While this most certainly has something to do with the personnel on hand, it was nice to see an athletic quarterback bring it back to life for a few drives on Sunday.
