Niners Nation
When San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch spoke earlier this week, they had no issues going into detail…until it came to topics involving wide receiver Jauan Jennings.
Lynch said that Jennings is making progress as he works through his calf issue, and that he was unsure if we’d see Jennings in Week 1. Most of the follow-up questions Lynch received were one-sentence answers.
Lynch acknowledged that Jennings’ calf injury was worse than the team initially had thought, but it was like pulling teeth to extract any other information out of Lynch.
Lynch confirmed that Jauan asked for a trade, but replied, “I’m not getting into when it was.” And when pressed about negotiations, Lynch said, “We keep those things behind the scenes, we have throughout the offseason, and we’ll leave it at that.”
The San Francisco Standard’s Tim Kawakami appeared on 95.7 The Game to share what he’s hearing about Jennings’ contract on Thursday:
What you hear, not from the camp but from NFL circles, is that it’s high. It’s above $20 million, is what I’ve heard. And maybe a lot above 20 a year, to put him in the top 20 or so receivers — in that realm. The 49ers have done it before with Brandon Aiyuk, so there is precedent for lifting a guy way up on the higher ranks of the receiver salaries.
I have a few thoughts about the above quote. First off, if true, hats off to you, Jauan. Shooters shoot. Mike Evans is making $20.5 million annually. He’s projected to be a Hall of Famer.
Three teams in the NFL are paying north of $20 million annually to two receivers on the same team. The Bengals are paying Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins. Objectively, two WR1s on any team in any scheme with any quarterback. The same is true for Philadelphia Eagles wideouts A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith. Lastly, the Washington Commanders are paying Terry McLaurin and could afford to absorb Deebo Samuel’s contract because they have a quarterback on a rookie deal.
Is anybody putting Jennings, even after what he accomplished last season, in the same tier as those receivers above? Unlikely. You don’t see opposing defenses roll coverage toward Jennings the same way they do with Chase or Brown. Respectfully, Jennings is more of a product of his environment, aka Kyle Shanahan’s scheme, than the next big-time receiver in this league.
In the same breath, somebody leaked this to Kawakami, knowing that it would paint Jennings in a bad light. It’s the nasty side of the business. You put information out there to the media that a player wants roughly double what he’s worth, and fans will look at that number, scoff, and want nothing to do with Jennings.
Here’s more from Kawakami, this time, from the 49ers perspective:
What I’ve heard from the 49ers side, in the air on that one, is that they don’t want to do anything. They are negotiating. I...
