Scoots1994 wrote:CrimsonCrew wrote:Scoots1994 wrote:Taylor and Samuel were talented enough to warrant their picks, Sanders was worth it (Super Bowl), and Aiyuk is not known yet. I'm not one to blame the GM for odd injuries that happen so putting Hurd in the unknown is not unreasonable.
They have certainly been unlucky with WR injuries, every name on that list other than Aiyuk and Sanders missed games. It seems the 49ers struggle with injuries a LOT.
Samuel is a prime example of the FO's issue, IMO. Sure, in a vacuum he was talented enough. But in the context of that draft, we could have traded back and almost certainly still gotten him, and definitely still gotten AJ Brown. The Sanders trade was worth it, even though I felt we overpaid at the time, but it's still frustrating to give up those high value picks for a one-year rental. If we had taken McLaurin instead of Hurd in the third last year, I don't think we make that mid-season trade.
But you don't know that to be true. You are basing it on the mock draft world and they are regularly wildly wrong. It only takes one team to see the same thing in a player to lose him. It's data we essentially never get (I wish we did) ... how every team actually ranked players they didn't take. And I'm not going to blame a team for a draft pick getting injured because that's using data they didn't have available when they made the decision.
Whenever a player goes above the consensus mock draft position the team made a "major mistake", if the player then becomes an all-pro nobody really talks about it anymore. Every year there are players I like much higher than their "ranking" and sometimes I'm right and sometimes I'm wildly wrong.
I agree and also think Shanahan falls in love with a player and does over-value/over-pay for them, but I don't agree that the players would "almost certainly" be available much later in the draft/for significantly less FA money.
On the bright side, now that the 49ers are not a leaguewide laughingstock FAs should be willing to join the 49ers for at or maybe even below market rather than far above market.
I do know that they could have traded back and still gotten AJ Brown because he was still on the board. One pick after we took Samuel, the Seahawks traded 37 for 47 and 77. We should have made that trade. No receivers went between Samuel and Brown, and Brown went 51st. I think it is exceedingly likely that Samuel would have lasted that long as well, but even if he wasn't, we would have gotten Brown.
I don't fault the team all that much for the Hurd injuries, but Hurd had injury issues coming out, so it's not like it was surprising he has continued to deal with them as a pro.
I appreciate these are relatively small complaints. Shanahan and Lynch have done an exceptional job of overhauling the roster and implementing their vision, and they deserve a lot of credit for it.
