The San Francisco 49ers made a few changes to their passing attack this offseason, including trading Deebo Samuel to the Washington Commanders for a fifth-round pick, signing Demarcus Robinson, Ross Dwelley and Luke Farrell, letting Eric Saubert sign with the Seattle Seahawks and losing Chris Conley to retirement.
With all of those changes, quarterback Brock Purdy will certainly see new faces and numbers around him in the huddle when he goes under center for the team’s Week 1 matchup against the Seattle Seahawks at Lumen Field.
Despite the significant departure of Samuel, who caught 334 passes for 4,792 yards and 22 touchdowns and rushed for 1,143 yards and 20 touchdowns on 5.7 yards per attempt for San Francisco over the last six years, the 49ers receiving corps is still seen as one of the best in the league.
In fact, Pro Football Focus’ Trevor Sikkema recently ranked the receiving corps of all 32 NFL teams, and he had the 49ers at No. 5 behind the Detroit Lions (No. 4), Cincinnati Bengals (No. 3), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (No. 2) and Philadelphia Eagles (No. 1).
“The 49ers’ receiving corps is an unknown, given Brandon Aiyuk‘s recovery from ACL and MCL tears and Christian McCaffrey‘s limited playing time last season while dealing with PCL and Achilles injuries,” Sikkema wrote. “But the fact of the matter is, McCaffrey has earned 84.0-plus PFF receiving grades in six of his eight seasons, including the last one in which he was fully healthy (2023), and Aiyuk was one of the highest graded receivers in the league (91.7) in 2023.
“If they are healthy and can feature alongside George Kittle, who ranked second in PFF receiving grade (92.6) among tight ends last season, as well as Jauan Jennings and Ricky Pearsall, the group deserves the benefit of the doubt, even without Deebo Samuel.”
Obviously, Kittle is doing a ton of heavy lifting for this group, after he finished his 2024 campaign with 78 receptions for 1,106 yards and eight touchdowns before receiving a massive extension that made him the highest-paid tight end in the league this offseason.
On paper, however, there are teams behind San Francisco that have legitimate arguments to be ranked above them, including the Minnesota Vikings (No. 6), Miami Dolphins (No. 7) and Los Angeles Rams (No. 8). Even the Chicago Bears (No. 9) and Houston Texans (No. 10) could prove to be better if their young guys step up.
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