The Band Will Be Back…Will The Sound Be The Same? The 49ers in 2024
NFL Offseason Roster Review #31
In many respects, the San Francisco 49ers have everything they need to be a championship contender in 2024. The roster is once again filled with big names and big contracts, but quarterback Brock Purdy, who is generating somewhere in the neighborhood of $40-45 million in surplus cap value on his current cap hit of $1 million per year, makes all that possible.
That means the 49ers can keep the band together in 2024. Their quartet of playmakers, Christian McCaffrey, Deebo Samuel, Brandon Aiyuk, and George Kittle are all under contract. Some might argue they could use an upgrade on the offensive line, but San Francisco had a pretty good offense with this group last season, and they return their top five linemen in terms of snaps played. The defensive line depth is a more fluid situation, but Nick Bosa, Javon Hargrave, and Arik Armstead are still under contract, as are the key players on the back end. Linebacker Dre Greenlaw and safety Talanoa Hufanga are both recovering from serious lower-half injuries, but if that pair returns to form, the 49ers will once again field a rangy, instinctive defense in 2024. In terms of roster-building resources, San Francisco is working with an extra third-round pick, and while they are currently $500,000 over the cap (per Spotrac), they have some big cap hits, such as the $28 million attached to the final year of Armstead’s deal, that could be adjusted with an extension.
The bigger question is whether this team is due for a reboot. They were clearly good enough to win the Super Bowl this year - the game went to overtime, after all - but is the team going to have the same vibes moving forward after yet another disappointment on the game’s biggest stage?
If problems are looming, 49ers fans have to hope general manager John Lynch and head coach Kyle Shanahan can identify the issue and pivot, because the bigger disappointment would be if they don’t put together another run on Purdy’s rookie deal. They’ve already moved on from defensive coordinator Steve Wilks to shake things up on defense; do they need to make a similar move on offense, or is this group ready to rock with Purdy in 2024?
The Quarterback
Brock Purdy is in an incredible position heading into 2024.
As a big fan of the Iowa State program, I wanted Purdy’s NFL career to take off as much as anyone, but I had some reservations heading into his second season. Purdy had done a lot of positive things during his rookie season, but I thought there were some mistakes that he was getting away with that would eventually even out. These weren’t fatal flaws - before the NFC Championship Game, I thought Purdy had a great chance to develop in those areas during the offseason - but then he suffered a severe injury to his throwing arm.
Amazingly - and I don’t think this gets talked about enough - Purdy came back better than ever despite spending his offseason focused on rehab. Nobody is going to confuse him with Josh Allen, but his arm looked strong, and some of the areas of concern - namely, a tendency to drift in the pocket and some “good not great” ball placement - disappeared in his second season.
This offseason, Purdy can focus on training rather than rehab, and given some of the gains we’ve seen other NFL players make with innovative new training modalities, folks should be excited to see Purdy on the hoof the first day of training camp. I’m not suggesting he will look like a completely different guy, but if he becomes 5% more explosive as an athlete, giving himself a little more juice as a runner and a passer, it could have an outsized impact on his game.
Either way, the 49ers are in a good spot with Purdy at the helm. One of the most important tools for any quarterback is a great sense of timing, and it’s clear that Purdy has that. He might not be the fastest runner or possess overwhelming arm strength, but he moves when he needs to move, and puts the ball where it needs to be when it needs to be there. At the end of the day, he’s an excellent football player, and he’s shown he can come through in clutch moments; on top of the comebacks against the Packers and Lions on the way to the Super Bowl, Purdy walked off the field against Kansas City with the lead in overtime, and that’s nothing to sneeze at.
A New Defensive Coordinator
Coach Shanahan would probably take the Lombardi and another season of Steve Wilks, but when you look at some of San Francisco’s patterns from this season, it’s clear that a Super Bowl win might have resulted in an awkward “mutual decision to part ways.”
This is not an exhaustive list, but two things stuck out to me throughout the 2024 season: (1) San Francisco’s issues defending the misdirection run game and (2) San Francisco’s penchant for “zero-blitzing” at ill-timed moments, which first showed up in their loss to the Vikings when Jordan Addison scored on a deep post route into zero right before halftime. The first issue nearly sank the 49ers in the Divisional and Championship rounds against Green Bay and Detroit, while Shanahan used a timeout to get out of a zero-blitz call in the Super Bowl.
Whatever happened, something between Shanahan and Wilks didn’t click, and the 49ers are once again looking for a new defensive coordinator. They will likely bring in another coordinator who emphasizes a four-down front - with defensive line coach Kris Kocurek in place, it’s hard to imagine the 49ers not putting the emphasis on that group - but one who will make the necessary tweaks within that framework to get this defense back to the standard Shanahan expects.
Close But No Cigar?
Unfortunately, that’s just the way it goes sometimes; ask the 2017-2020 New Orleans Saints, the Buffalo Bills of the late 1980s, or Andy Reid’s squads in Philadelphia during the 2000s.
For some teams, past disappointments can serve as a rallying cry, but as players get older, the missed opportunities are going to take their toll. Turnover in the NFL is constant, and whether or not the 49ers could have won four of the last five Super Bowls, the key moment has always gone the other team’s way. In 2019, Mahomes completed that absurd 3rd-down pass to Tyreek Hill. In 2021, the Rams and Matthew Stafford caught a break in the NFC Championship Game when safety Jaquiski Tartt dropped a potential game-sealing interception. In 2022, the 49ers ran out of quarterbacks against Philadelphia in the NFC Championship Game. And in 2023, Kansas City’s only touchdown in regulation came on a sixteen-yard field after a punt bounced off a blocker on San Francisco’s return team.
Are the 49ers ever going to catch the break they need? Or will Kyle Shanahan, like Reid, wind up needing a fresh start to finally get a Lombardi?
Time will tell, but if they can get their minds and spirits right - and get the bodies healed up - San Francisco should have every chance to change the narrative in 2024.
Early 2024 Projection: 2nd in the NFC West (The Rams are rising; next year’s Battles of California should be epic!)