ORLANDO, Fla. — Standing on the sideline at Michigan’s professional day final week, San Francisco 49ers basic supervisor John Lynch and Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin shared fun when Tomlin introduced up Niners extensive receiver Brandon Aiyuk.
Hypothesis about Aiyuk’s future with the crew has continued for greater than a 12 months and reached a crescendo this offseason as Aiyuk prepares for the ultimate 12 months on his rookie contract. That features rumored trades all around the NFL map, together with to Tomlin’s Steelers.
Chatting with a small group of reporters Monday afternoon on the NFL league conferences, Lynch supplied his most definitive assertion but that not solely is Aiyuk not out there for commerce however that the crew has already begun discussing with Aiyuk and his representatives the parameters of an extension that may maintain him round long run.
“[Tomlin] is like, ‘Bro, what is going on on,'” Lynch stated, laughing. “I promise you nothing’s occurring there. We’re actively speaking with Brandon attempting to determine one thing out. Now we have an excellent historical past of working with the fellows we need to get carried out to get one thing carried out and it takes two sides. So, can we try this? We’ll see. There’s a variety of totally different instructions that it might go however we respect the heck out of Brandon and who he’s as a participant, and we wish him to be part of the Niners. We will work in direction of making {that a} actuality.”
Aiyuk, in the meantime, posted an Instagram story Monday afternoon with a collection of emojis that translate to, “cash talks, bulls— walks.”
The commerce conjecture surrounding Aiyuk has by no means come from the 49ers. Ultimately 12 months’s league conferences in Arizona, Lynch confirmed that the Niners had been approached by different groups to gauge their curiosity in dealing Aiyuk, just for Lynch and coach Kyle Shanahan to reject these overtures.
However that hasn’t stopped the dialog from persevering with, largely due to the Niners’ more and more top-heavy roster that features extremely paid stars similar to left sort out Trent Williams, defensive finish Nick Bosa, receiver Deebo Samuel, tight finish George Kittle and linebacker Fred Warner.
The surface assumption has been that the 49ers could be unable to signal the ascending Aiyuk — who’s coming off a 75-catch, 1,342-yard, 7-touchdown season that landed him a second crew All Professional nod — due to the cap crunch created by these different contracts.
Aiyuk is at the moment scheduled to depend $14.124 million towards the cap in 2024 ought to he play below the fifth-year choice the crew exercised on the 2020 No. 25 total choose final summer season. With a contract extension, the Niners might really decrease that cap hit and keep a comparatively small quantity for 2025 in order that by the point his bigger salaries kick in, a few of these different big-money offers could be off the books.
“There’s nothing higher than drafting a man, creating a man, watching him flourish after which rewarding him,” Lynch stated. “That is actually what we might like to do.”
Whereas Lynch is optimistic a deal for Aiyuk might be carried out, he additionally was clear that it will not be simple. The Niners have a historical past of getting profitable contract extensions carried out with their homegrown stars similar to Kittle, Warner, Samuel and Bosa however these discussions have at all times lasted as much as and generally into coaching camp. Simply final 12 months, Bosa’s megadeal wasn’t finalized till days earlier than the season opener towards the Steelers.
It is doable an analogous state of affairs might play out for Aiyuk, who the Niners envision as a part of their subsequent nucleus of stars to construct round.
“We’re speaking together with his guys and attempting to speak about some parameters of some issues,” Lynch stated. “We’re having discussions. That is an excellent factor.”
On Monday, Lynch additionally defined the accounting error that price the Niners a fifth-round draft choose in 2025 and 4 draft slots on the finish of the fourth spherical this 12 months.
In response to Lynch, through the 2020 season the Niners overpaid a participant by $75,000. Whereas that fee didn’t push them over the wage cap, additionally they didn’t uncover it till the autumn of 2022. After making an attempt to recoup the cash, the 49ers ultimately reported the error to the league. Lynch indicated that delay in reporting is why the NFL determined to penalize the crew as a lot because it did even when he disagreed with the punishment.
“I’ve a distinction of opinion on the severity of the self-discipline,” Lynch stated. “We take accountability for what occurred … We personal our half, we have gone by means of a complete mitigation deal to treatment a few of the points that occurred, however the league determined to impose that. So, you are taking your medication, and you progress on.”
As for a few injured Niners, Lynch confirmed that Kittle and cornerback Charvarius Ward each had core muscle surgical procedures that may maintain them out for the whole offseason program, however they need to be capable of return for coaching camp.
“I’ve had that surgical procedure myself after I was taking part in and [it has a] fairly excessive success fee of therapeutic and it feels loads higher when you get it carried out,” Lynch stated. “It hurts continually having that core tugging at you. So these guys have each received that mounted.”
