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The San Francisco 49ers are back into offseason mode, and one position that’s always talked about with the team at this time of the year is the defensive line. San Francisco has been known for having an elite defensive line during the Kyle Shanahan era, but it hasn’t reached that standard the last two seasons, which brings up questions for their plan this offseason. Last year, the 49ers elected to go younger at defensive line. They released Javon Hargrave, Maliek Collins, and Leonard Floyd and looked to fill those spots via the draft and a trade. The team drafted Mykel Williams in the first round, Alfred Collins in the second round, and C.J. West in the fourth round to infuse some youth into the position group. They also traded for Philadelphia Eagles pass rusher Bryce Huff, who had four sacks, two forced fumbles, a team-high 46 pressures, and a 14.6 percent pass-rush win rate according to PFF. That group was expected to pair with star pass rusher Nick Bosa, giving the team an elite player to help with some developing talent. Bosa had even been around the team earlier than usual in the offseason to help streamline the process. However, the year didn’t go as expected. Bosa, who had enjoyed a pretty strong start to the season with 10 pressures and a 20 percent pass-rush win rate through 2.5 games, tore his ACL in Week 3, ruling him out for the season. That took away a major component of the 49ers defensive front, which struggled to get pressure as a unit from that point on. Of course, the loss of Fred Warner a few weeks later further emphasized that issue, and the 49ers lost Mykel Williams to a torn ACL as well midway through the year. Still, there’s a ton of young talent returning to the team, while the hope is for Bosa to return around training camp next year. So, what did the 49ers think of the defensive line group this year, and what can we expect in 2026? “I think we look at everything there [on the defensive line],” general manager John Lynch said this week. “I will tell you, I don’t think [the issues we had] was scheme-related. Yes, everything ties together, rush and coverage, all of those things. Certain players, you never want to make excuses, but certain players, it’s not only their impact, but they’re force multipliers. They make everybody else around them better. “And I think Nick was that, I think Mykel was just catching on. You know, we’ve got to be better there. We understand that. That’s always been at the forefront of our philosophy to make life miserable on opposing quarterbacks and to wreak havoc, and we need to do better there, and we intend on doing that.” The 49ers are better positioned financially this offseason after making such drastic moves with their roster cuts last year, and could very well target a defensive lineman in free agency on top of their returning pieces. With Bosa being a bookend on the edge, a defensive tackle could be a good idea, allowing Alfred Collins and C.J. West to continue developing while competing for the other spot in the middle. But the 49ers acknowledged their issues this year were much more personnel-related than scheme-related. A part of that was the team’s injuries at the position, but they probably also have to upgrade the room this offseason.

The Seattle Seahawks made the San Francisco 49ers look slow on both sides of the ball. The defense struggled to catch up to Kenneth Walker and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, while the pass catchers couldn’t run away from Seattle’s secondary. Outside of a couple of routes, that was true in the Wild Card round against the Philadelphia Eagles, too. Head coach Kyle Shanahan was asked on Wednesday if he felt improving team speed is a priority this offseason, and whether Shanahan feels like it’s something the team needs more of moving forward: “Yes, definitely. I mean, being fast helps, being good helps. There’s lots of ways to do it, but you’d love it balanced out perfectly with your whole team offensively, defensively, special teams. But, we noticeably were slower this year than we have been in year’s past. Sometimes that’s substituted for a better football player. That doesn’t mean you’re always worse because of that. But, you definitely need more speed out there to handle things week-in and week-out for some of the situations that come up versus certain schemes and certain defenses, certain offenses too.” Earlier in the week, we felt like one of the 49ers’ fatal flaws was the lack of team speed. That answer suggests Shanahan agrees. Demarcus Robinson ran a 4.59 40-yard dash ten years ago at the NFL Combine. Kendrick Bourne ran a 4.68 40. Jauan Jennings, a 4.72. These are players who played significant roles for the 49ers this past season at wide receiver. That’s where inserting a player like rookie Jordan Watkins or whether the myth of Jacob Cowing will make a difference. Ricky Pearsall proved he can win down the field, but when you can’t balance the field with multiple threats, your offense becomes easier to defend. The 49ers were excellent at limiting explosive plays defensively, but that was centered on playing top-down coverage more than on their cornerbacks being shut down. Deommodore Lenoir’s 40-time was in the 64th percentile, but his 20-yard shuttle was in the 13th percentile, with a 29th percentile vertical jump and 30th percentile 3-cone. Those numbers do not scream high-end athlete. Renardo Green’s jumps were above average, but his 40 was in the 46th percentile. Ji’Ayir Brown’s 40 was in the 18th percentile. An infusion of athleticism at wide receiver and defensive back will go a long way in the 49ers’ upgrading their team speed this offseason.

The San Francisco 49ers took a different approach to free agency this past offseason, electing to shed veteran salaries and clear their books more, while also letting several players depart in free agency. In return, the 49ers didn’t make any major splash signing, with Luke Farrell’s three-year, $15.75 million contract being the biggest they handed out. The goal was to get younger and cheaper, while also having the cash to extend key players. So, the 49ers made all 11 of their draft selections, while extending Brock Purdy (five years, $265 million), George Kittle (four years, $76.4 million), and Fred Warner (three years, $63 million). They looked to replace the departures on defense via the draft, as they took players on that side of the ball with their first five picks in April. It looked like a bit of a transitional period for the 49ers, who still kept a number of blue-chip players but were also looking to develop younger pieces. Well, they had quite the season, despite losing Warner and Nick Bosa to season-ending injuries, winning 13 games, and making the NFC Divisional Round. Now, with core players getting one year older, will the 49ers look to spend more in free agency this offseason? At the team’s end-of-year press conference, head coach Kyle Shanahan acknowledged that they did take a different approach last offseason because of their spending in previous years, which made the team’s success even more impressive. “Yeah, that is a broad question. Good one,” head coach Kyle Shanahan said about the team potentially spending more in free agency. “I mean, last year was a huge challenge. Salary cap-wise and what we’ve gone for, for numbers of years, you can’t do that every year. That’s the way it’s set up. And we had done that too many years in a row, so we had to make a decision to cut on money last year. That wasn’t us being cheap or anything. We actually spend more, almost as much, or more than everybody. That’s what you have to do in the cycle of how it’s all based. “And more so than the injuries, that was the hardest thing to overcome is how many good players we had to let go out of this building that went and helped a lot of other teams. That’s why when we did have significant injuries to some very good players, yeah it was more daunting than it was in year’s past because some of the guys we would’ve hung on, when you lose a guy like Fred or you lose a guy like Nick, those guys we lost because of free agency and stuff that we had to do because of the previous year. So yes, if you would’ve told me that we lost those guys before the season with what we were going into, I wouldn’t have expected us to have the record and stuff that we did. “But, that’s when you look at things as a whole and you try to give a narrative to a whole. We just prepare for a game each week. And there were very few Sundays that we felt by the time we got there that we didn’t have a chance to win. And I thought we did play well. I thought our players grinded and overcame a ton of things this year and it gave us a chance to make the playoffs. I never sit there and say like, ‘oh, this will be successful if we just get close to the playoffs or something like that.’ I mean, we always expect to try to compete for the playoffs. We know some seasons are going to be harder than others, which we thought this would be. And I am proud to a degree of what we accomplished.” Now, with the season over, the 49ers will re-evaluate where they are financially and look ahead to potentially spending more in free agency. “That doesn’t mean I’m sitting here three days removed and having great perspective,” Shanahan continued. “Once you get to that point, you believe you can get to the next point because you can’t get that far if that isn’t possible. So, we’re really disappointed right now with how the season ended and still dealing with that.…