thesack12 wrote:CrimsonCrew wrote:thesack12 wrote:Of course its pre-season, so its far from a sure thing. But from what we've seen, Sherfield looks like he could be a usable WR for this team.
Some of that could on Lance making him look good, some of that could be Shanny scheming him well. That said, Trent seems to be getting open pretty frequently. Which is more than I can say for the huge pile of unwantedness consisting of James, Cracraft, Taylor, White, etc. And its looking more and more likely, that we will never see Jalen Hurd suit up for a regular season game.
Apparently Jennings has been having a good camp as well. Hopefully between Sherfield and Jennings platoon, 9ers can find some semblance of a halfway passable WR3.
WR is a big concern for this team, but that's nothing new. We've known that for a long while now. Both Deebo and Aiyuk are injury prone, and if either of them go down it will get ugly.
The Hurd pick will never not make me crazy, unless he somehow reverses the entire trajectory of his career to date. We took that dude over Terry McLaurin, who I was screaming for at that point (to be completely fair, I didn't really want another WR, but he was my guy if we went with that position, and prior to the draft I endorsed passing on WR in the second and taking McLaurin in the third). We should have come out of that draft with Bosa, AJ Brown, and McLaurin. Would have been one of the great drafts....
Yes, its incredily frustrating.
Hurd has a unique skillset, and I don't doubt that Shanny could scheme Jalen to where he could be a very effective player. There also have been a huge hole in the WR corps for the last handful of years, that Hurd could/should have been able to plug. But like with most things, it comes down to availability. Short of that 2 TD preseason game in his rookie year, Hurd just hasn't been able to give the 9ers anything. Dude just can't get right physically.
Some of that needs to fall at the feet of the team brass. Hurd had durability concerns in college, and he's done nothing but confirm that he is not reliable.
At this point, I expect him to not play a snap for the 49ers. Anything more than that, I will consider a bonus.
Yeah, he's a tantalizing guy in this offense. Great size, unique movement skills, and the ability to play out of the backfield a bit. I can definitely see the allure. But the reality is that he was a raw WR prospect with injury history and questions about his commitment (granted switching from RB to WR is a savvy longterm move that suggests he's also intelligent), and we took him over a legit WR prospect who had been fairly successful in a college offense that misused him, and who then blew up the Senior Bowl and the combine. It was a reach for the wrong guy at the position, and one of a laundry list of guys (Reuben Foster, Joe Williams, Dante Pettis) who failed not because of physical ability, but because of mental makeup/lack of commitment.
Hurd is a bit different due to the injuries, but I also can't help but question how much he's really hurt vs. fighting for his football life.