2025 OFFSEASON

[clyde21]

good news is that the first four picks of the 2024 draft look decent, we'll see what happens with Ricky but Puni, Mustapha and Green all look like good contributors.

[Pattersonca65]

Overall, the 49ers under Lynch and Shanahan have been a strong team in the draft. However, much of that has been because of their hit rate late in the draft. In the first three rounds, they have been pretty shaky. It's hard to gain context sometimes because we're so locked in on the Niners that we lose sight of how often teams miss in the early rounds, but I think it's reasonable to have higher expectations for the team, especially when guys are busting or disappointing for reasons that were clear when they were drafted.

Bill Walsh certainly had misses in the first round. I remember quite a few first and second round misses by Walsh but he always cane back and got a great draft. He literally restocked much of a team with the 1986 draft. Considered one of the best drafts ever by a team

[Jikkle]

good news is that the first four picks of the 2024 draft look decent, we'll see what happens with Ricky but Puni, Mustapha and Green all look like good contributors.

I thought Guerendo flashed later on during the season and started to be more and more decisive when hitting the hole. The question now is if he's going to be another guy that's constantly injured.

A lot to be excited about Ricky because he had a strong final two games and it felt like once he got the feel of the game and Shanahan focused the passing attack more on him over Deebo he was starting to come into his own.

Overall if we hit on the first 5 picks of this draft that's an excellent draft.

The jury's still out on Cowing as well and hopefully he can break into the lineup to provide some desperately needed speed. I won't say him not getting many snaps is a terrible sign for him because Shanahan just typically avoids playing rookies if he can but if he doesn't contribute much next season it's likely he won't amount to much.

[Jikkle]

Overall, the 49ers under Lynch and Shanahan have been a strong team in the draft. However, much of that has been because of their hit rate late in the draft. In the first three rounds, they have been pretty shaky. It's hard to gain context sometimes because we're so locked in on the Niners that we lose sight of how often teams miss in the early rounds, but I think it's reasonable to have higher expectations for the team, especially when guys are busting or disappointing for reasons that were clear when they were drafted.

I've been saying this forever.

Fans get so hyperfocused on their team they don't see the fans of 31 complaining about the same exact stuff we do. That's not to say we're wrong about our assessments and we shouldn't be critical but I guarantee you there are fanbases of other teams that complain their team drafted X player instead of Warner, Greenlaw, Kittle, or etc etc.

I've always contended that you simply don't have the prolonged success we've had without talent and good coaching. I question if Shanahan can ever get out of his own way to win a Super Bowl but there is no question he is at least a good coach.

My other big draft pet peeve is fans that get way too caught up in "value". Don't get me wrong I'm not completely dismissing the importance of maximizing value and you don't want to draft Moody with a 3rd round pick when you could get him as an UDFA or at least with a 6th or 7th round pick. But when you pick Pearsall late 1st and have people complain that we reached because the sports media had him as an early 2nd round pick it's just silly IMO.

[wco81]

I don't care about other teams.

You can give them a Mulligan for Solomon Thomas. Maybe even forgive Ruben Foster since it was part of that same, first draft.

But they just pile up over the years, McGlinchey, Kinlaw, Lance, Bettis, Aaron Banks, Drake Jackson, Witherspoon, Bethard, Jalen Hurd, Ambry Thomas, Moody, Tavarius Moore.

They got very LUCKY that players drafted in the 5th or later turned out to be Pro Bowl or HoF-level players (Kittle). Especially PURDY performing way above the consensus scouting.

[clyde21]

i mean im sure we can find plenty of bad-drafting teams but who cares, that shouldn't be our standard

most FOs would've been evicted for the Trey Lance trade disaster. we kinda lucked out there with the Brock Purdy bailout (which you can credit the FO for) but most other FOs wouldn't have survived that. add in their first draft which was terrible, the following year was also terrible save for the Warner pick, the year after was the Bosa/Deebo pick but Bosa was kind of gimmie pick, then the Kinlaw pick which was absurd.

and to top it all off we wasted a 3rd round pick on not just a kicker but what ended up being the worst kicker in the entire league, two back-to-back 3rd round picks on RBs (Sermon and TDP) who are both no longer on the team...just a lot of wastage and nonsense.

[CrimsonCrew]

i mean im sure we can find plenty of bad-drafting teams but who cares, that shouldn't be our standard

most FOs would've been evicted for the Trey Lance trade disaster. we kinda lucked out there with the Brock Purdy bailout (which you can credit the FO for) but most other FOs wouldn't have survived that. add in their first draft which was terrible, the following year was also terrible save for the Warner pick, the year after was the Bosa/Deebo pick but Bosa was kind of gimmie pick, then the Kinlaw pick which was absurd.

and to top it all off we wasted a 3rd round pick on not just a kicker but what ended up being the worst kicker in the entire league, two back-to-back 3rd round picks on RBs (Sermon and TDP) who are both no longer on the team...just a lot of wastage and nonsense.

Yeah, and there's a colorable argument that Cam Latu was the worst third-round pick of the bunch. Though TDP also had like a 5th or 6th round grade, and was a RB.

I stand by the position that even really good teams miss on at least 50% of picks in the first three rounds, which is easy to lose sight of when you don't follow a team closely, but our FO has to do a better job. Really only Bosa and Aiyuk have been impact first rounders. Samuel is the only second-round hit (Green looks good, but won't count him yet), and we should have taken AJ Brown (I explicitly said during that draft that I would have traded down and taken Brown) even though Deebo was a better fit for our offense for about two years.

And we're not close to 50%. We've been mediocre at best in the first round, worse when you consider we burned three firsts and a third on Lance, and have been downright bad in the second and third. It's really a miracle they've made it so far given the mess drafts have been. Hopefully last year signaled that they are turning over a new leaf.

[Samurai]

Glad that we re-signed Ben Bartch; was afraid that we might lose him. In his small sample size, he was our highest graded O-linemen last season (outside of Trent and Puni) so he should be able to compete for our LG starting position. If he can build off his performance from last season, he should be an upgrade over Banks.

[CrimsonCrew]

Glad that we re-signed Ben Bartch; was afraid that we might lose him. In his small sample size, he was our highest graded O-linemen last season (outside of Trent and Puni) so he should be able to compete for our LG starting position. If he can build off his performance from last season, he should be an upgrade over Banks.

That's great news, assuming it's pretty low dollar. Bartch could easily be our starting LG this year, and he played pretty well there last year. He can also play C. If we draft a potential LG, I'd at least give him a shot at starting over Brendel based on what Brendel put out there last year.

[Jikkle]

Bartch seemed like he could be the new Feliciano of the team so I'm glad they resigned him.

Obviously having another Puni-level interior guy would be great but I've always contended that all we need is the offensive line to at least be average to slightly above average to have a successful offense.

I'll be interested in seeing what they do with the C position because I don't know if we can go another year with Brendel at the helm. This might be a year they dip into free agency to get a C since it is one position Shanahan has shown some willingness to invest some money in if he finds a guy he loves. Not to mention the seat he's on is a little hotter so there is more pressure to turn things around.

The dream scenario to me is to draft an OT at #11 and to sign a C as a free agent which could mean a substantial upgrade to the offensive line and get the offense back to being highly efficient.

[CrimsonCrew]

Bartch seemed like he could be the new Feliciano of the team so I'm glad they resigned him.

Obviously having another Puni-level interior guy would be great but I've always contended that all we need is the offensive line to at least be average to slightly above average to have a successful offense.

I'll be interested in seeing what they do with the C position because I don't know if we can go another year with Brendel at the helm. This might be a year they dip into free agency to get a C since it is one position Shanahan has shown some willingness to invest some money in if he finds a guy he loves. Not to mention the seat he's on is a little hotter so there is more pressure to turn things around.

The dream scenario to me is to draft an OT at #11 and to sign a C as a free agent which could mean a substantial upgrade to the offensive line and get the offense back to being highly efficient.

The stars seem to be aligning for a move at center. Shanahan doesn't seem inclined to trust a rookie, it's a bad center class, and the guys who are potentially best at the position are projections (many of whom played OT in college). We just can't go into another season with Brendel at center. He was downright awful in pass protection last year, and he turns 33 early next season.

That said, I'm not sure the alternatives will be great. Drew Dalman is almost certainly the cream of the crop, but there's a good chance he's re-signed or will be expensive if not. He's only 26. He also wasn't a great pass-blocker last year, with a 66.6 PFF grade (22nd among Cs), though he's a beast in the run game. Ryan Kelly is the next best. He's turning 32 in May, and while his pass-blocking is good (71.9, 12th among Cs), his run-blocking might be below Shanahan's threshold (64, 30th). My preference might be a guy like Coleman Shelton. He's a bit younger than Brendel and Kelly (29), and wasn't great in either pass or run (68.4 pass, 66.7 run), but he's at least decent at both. For the price, he might be the better addition if he truly comes free.

The other intriguing option is Matt Hennessy, who is already on the roster. He barely played last year, and has been injured lately, but he was a good run-blocker in 2021 (though pretty awful as a pass-blocker). I think he lost his job to Dalman the next year, and was on the bench and then cut by the Eagles this year (I think there was an injury), but he's a guy who has shown some flashes. He was a third-round pick who put up good testing numbers coming out.

At this point, I'm just ready to be rid of Brendel, at least as a starter. He dragged the entire offense down last year. We can't go into this season with him starting.

[clyde21]

Great news on Bartch, go back and watch the type of holes he was opening up against Buffalo. maybe it was an outlier but he was a monster in that game.

[Pattersonca65]

Coaching changes and additions to staff

https://www.ninersnation.com/2025/2/25/24372943/49ers-mick-lombardi-brian-griese-jake-lynch-john-lynch

[49er4life1979]

49ers replace Brian Griese as QBs coach with Mick Lombardi. Klay Kubiak officially promoted to OC. And John Lynch's son Jake hired to coaching staff as Def QC. Interesting especially on the QB coach.

[CrimsonCrew]

Any word on what happened with Griese? That feels like a loss. Haven't heard that he's going elsewhere. I wonder if he decided coaching wasn't for him.

[Pattersonca65]

Any word on what happened with Griese? That feels like a loss. Haven't heard that he's going elsewhere. I wonder if he decided coaching wasn't for him.

What is being reported is he almost quit last year but Shanahan talked him into coming back one more season. He wants to be there for his family and coaching took on him on the road away from family.. seems the whole coaching grind

[wco81]

Deebo traded for a 5th round pick from the Commanders.

Mainly care what the cap hit/savings are from this move for the 49ers.

Presumably the pick will be around #150?

The other thing I'm curious about is whether the Commanders are going to be paying what Deebo was scheduled to earn this upcoming season if he was with the 49ers.

That should be the case unless he agrees to restructure?

Because the teams interested in Deebo could have just waited for the 49ers to release him and then see if he'd take a minimum contract or just a fraction of what he was going to get from the 49ers?

[Pattersonca65]

Deebo traded for a 5th round pick from the Commanders.

Mainly care what the cap hit/savings are from this move for the 49ers.

Presumably the pick will be around #150?

The other thing I'm curious about is whether the Commanders are going to be paying what Deebo was scheduled to earn this upcoming season if he was with the 49ers.

That should be the case unless he agrees to restructure?

Because the teams interested in Deebo could have just waited for the 49ers to release him and then see if he'd take a minimum contract or just a fraction of what he was going to get from the 49ers?

I dont think there is any cap savings.

[RIPskaterdude]

A 5th??? What a terrible offseason. We turned down a 3rd last year because we wanted a 1st or early 2nd

[Pattersonca65]

A 5th??? What a terrible offseason. We turned down a 3rd last year because we wanted a 1st or early 2nd

Unfortunately his stock fell last season with his play