SANTA CLARA — Ben Garland was never meant to be here; in this position.
He was never even meant to be a center — much less the starting center for a team with legitimate Super Bowl aspirations.
The NFL? Who saw that coming? He wasn’t even paid his first two years in the league.
And what is a captain with the Air National Guard 140th Security Forces Squadron doing in this NFL locker room, anyway?
While the path that has led Garland to his new role as the 49ers’ starting center was anything but traditional and certainly didn’t follow any obvious plan, his coaches and teammates are anything but rattled with the development.