The 49ers' Budget for Free Agency
Breaking down the San Francisco 49ers' budget for free agency.
Transcript
00:00 What kind of budget do the Niners have for free agency? What are some realistic options?
00:03 Who would you like to see them go after? I have a couple. I have one name that I say on every show,
00:07 but I'm adamant. Okay. I talked with Jason Hurley last week, the cap guru for NinersCap.com.
00:15 Jason said that if the Niners do what he expects in terms of-
00:19 He's the best, by the way. He's very good.
00:21 He's the best. Jason, shout out Jason.
00:24 Yep. Absolutely. And thanks to Jason for
00:26 always being there to answer the question. Super generous.
00:29 Yes. Cool dude. So Jason said that basically
00:32 that all things being equal, the Niners would have Travarius Ward money to spend,
00:37 which would mean $14, $15 million. But that was before the cap went up to $255.
00:45 So the projection was $242.5. The actual result was $255.4. So you've added another $13 million.
00:54 And the question is, okay, does that now take their budget to $27? We don't know.
00:59 Real quick. Real quick. If they extend Brent and IUK now-ish, doesn't that create more cap space too?
01:05 $7 million. But they've already said that they want to extend IUK after free agency.
01:10 Oh, that's smart.
01:11 They're not going to save that $7 million, but they can still keep it in their heads and say
01:15 that, "Okay, we'll have that $7 million in savings from IUK that we can then apply to
01:19 paying the draft picks." The draft picks cost $11. So IUK contributes $7 to that. And then
01:26 you just got another $4 to worry about. Is it true that the Niners have the most
01:31 expensive roster this season, that they're spending the most on players?
01:34 Yeah, I think so.
01:35 Did you see that?
01:36 I haven't checked to make certain of that in terms of up to the last minute, but yeah.
01:41 Let's write some more checks for Jed York then. Who else are we going to make him pay? Let's get
01:46 this roster over $300 million for the year. Who'd they sign?
01:49 The guy that I pump is Jonathan Greenard from Houston. He's an edge, had 12.5 sacks, 15 hits,
01:58 30 pressures, top 10 in pass rush win rate, top 10 in run defense, and a great edge center.
02:06 Edge center, I'm sorry. And he's 26.
02:09 And why not?
02:10 Come on. Yeah. So he's the one. The question is though, how much is he going to cost?
02:18 SpotTrack says that Jonathan Greenard.
02:20 There you go. What spot did you say?
02:22 SpotTrack says 13.4. I think that that's too low. I think he's going to get more than that.
02:27 Okay.
02:28 But if I were the Niners, that would be my splash move. I would go get him
02:32 because that's what they need is an edge center that can also get to the pass rusher.
02:37 They don't need a dynamic pass rusher on his own. They just need a guy that can
02:42 clean up based on what the other three create. And that's something that Greenard can do.
02:46 Frankly, they could really use Samson Ebbecombe back. They could really use Samson Ebbecombe
02:50 back, but someone like that or a little better.
02:51 Yeah.
02:52 Yeah. So that's where I would go. If they can't get him, then I like Clowney. I think that Clowney
02:58 had a good year for Baltimore. He's a reliable player. He's been solid year after year. I'd go
03:03 with him and that's a bargain. Usually he should be like seven to eight. I would much rather do
03:09 that than chase him.
03:10 How was Clowney against the run?
03:15 Clowney's okay against the run, but Baltimore was preaching that. Mike McDonald wanted to make
03:20 sure that you could do that. He's not great against it, but he's a lot better than anything
03:24 the Niners have.
03:25 I like it. Okay. What else?
03:27 There's other positions they can look at. Tight end, I was championing Dalton Schultz. He just
03:35 got signed today. Three years, 36 million. John O. Smith from Atlanta, he'll probably be about
03:41 the same money. There's a couple others that you can look at. Noah Fant in Seattle and Hunter
03:49 Henry from New England. I would rather take a tight end and free agency than draft one. I think
03:55 this draft isn't very good for tight end, but if I had to guess, I think the Niners are going to
04:00 draft one.
04:01 Based on who they've talked to.
04:05 Well, they did a good job dropping the position last year.
04:07 So yeah.
04:08 Keep trying.
04:08 Yeah.
04:11 They've drafted-
04:11 It's the usual bit of let's just throw more darts.
04:13 I mean, they've just only missed at that position since 2017.
04:18 Right. Right.
04:19 What about Logan Thomas?
04:21 Yeah, maybe. I don't see-
04:24 He's 33.
04:25 Yeah, he's old, but if it's a one-year deal.
04:28 I think he had 55 catches last year. I mean, it'd be nice, number two receiver. Yeah,
04:32 one-year deal, incentives, nothing more than three, four million dollars, but I liked him.
04:38 Quarterback at Virginia Tech.
04:40 Yeah. Yeah.
04:41 Looking here at the chat, Gizmo asked Bryce Huff, "Huff is a designated pass rusher only.
04:49 He can't play the run." So if they wanted to spend in free agency for a guy that's
04:55 only there to rush the pass, or Huff is a possibility, but I think that he would-
04:59 They already had that.
05:00 ... do too much for that.
05:01 They got to get away from that.
05:02 I would much rather have Greener. Give me the complete player. That's what they need there.
05:08 They do. I mean, that was Chase Young. They got to get away from that.
05:12 They do. They need to be able to set the edge and defend the run. What about at DB?
05:17 DB, there's a guy in Jacksonville that was just-
05:22 Darius Williams?
05:23 Yeah.
05:24 Yeah.
05:24 But he's a little bit smaller, but he was second in the league in pass breakups.
05:29 He had four picks. He's a good player. He's 30. He's undersized, but if you thought that you could
05:35 move Lenore outside, then you could move him to the slot. You'd have a great secondary.
05:40 Yeah.
05:41 But you would be better at pass than run is the problem. I think that one of the things the
05:46 Niners are going to want to do is get better in their run defense from their DDs. I think that's
05:51 something they need to look at in the draft.
05:53 Yeah. Agree. What about restructuring Debo Samuel? His contract is awful.
06:01 It is. The problem is that if you hang on and you wait until next year,
06:07 then the contract is set up for them to get out of it. Tim Kawakami wrote about this earlier today.
06:13 The other thing, though, is that if you restructure Debo now, you save $15.8 million.
06:19 It's a lot of cap room. It gives them a lot more wiggle room in terms of what they could do in
06:24 free agency. I think that they're going to have to look at that, but if they do, it comes at a price
06:29 because it gets a lot harder to get out of Debo if you restructure him this year.
06:33 And it's even harder to deal him now. So it's just how hard do you want this to be?
06:40 How do you think the Niners feel about Debo? I mean, they just featured him big time in the
06:45 Super Bowl, so they seem confident in him before the game. Right. And then throughout the game,
06:51 considering they kept going to him, didn't work out so well. I mean, it seems like
06:55 did they change their mind or was it? I don't know.
06:58 I don't think so. I don't think so. It's Kyle was the real GM. He's going to want to keep Debo.
07:04 Debo is his favorite weapon in the game. They're friends, right? He was his friends for life.
07:10 He expects to have a friendship with him where he could call him and talk about anything
07:14 whenever long after they're off the team. That's what he said. So which is sticking around.
07:19 I don't think that's something a coach should do with a player, but that's me. I'm old school
07:24 and your dad agrees with me, but then we were going to coach.
07:27 Every place, so you're saying a coach shouldn't play favorites.
07:30 No, old school. There shouldn't be a combo click. There shouldn't be. You're such a boomer. Yes.
07:36 No. Nowadays you play favorites. Sorry. It's how we do it. Kids these days. Sorry. Not smart.
07:41 The problem is that then you've got Debo and you say, OK,
07:45 Debo is declining physically and his game is based on his physicality.
07:51 He's just going to get less effective over time. You need to get out of that.
07:55 And I'd be surprised if Kyle makes any move in that direction. I don't think it will.
08:00 Also, everyone else is like blocking their butts off to try to get targets. And he's
08:05 over there like jogging around the field, getting 11 targets. It's great.
08:08 Well, yeah, that's the culture.
08:10 Good to be friends with the coach.
08:13 That's really shows you how smart Debo Samuel is.
08:17 [MUSIC]