For the second time in three years, wide receiver Deebo Samuel Sr. has requested that the San Francisco 49ers trade him. This time, the 49ers are willing to accommodate such a move.
Samuel told ESPN on Sunday that the Niners granted he and agent Tory Dandy permission to find a trade partner after Samuel first expressed his desire to move on at his exit meeting with coach Kyle Shanahan in January.
“It was a hard conversation to have with Kyle because of the relationship that we have,” Samuel told ESPN’s Adam Schefter. “But I have to do what’s best. I’m more than thankful for the Niners giving me the opportunity of a lifetime but now I think it’s best that we find another team.”
Trading Samuel would come with significant salary cap ramifications for the Niners. They restructured Samuel’s contract in September, a move that means if they were to trade him before June 1, they would absorb a $31.55 million dead money hit on the cap. Samuel is also due a $15.4 million option bonus on March 22, which means the Niners would almost certainly want any deal completed before then.
If a trade can’t be consummated, the possibility remains that the Niners could release Samuel despite general manager John Lynch saying on Jan. 8 that such a move isn’t an option. In that scenario, the 49ers could use a post-June 1 designation on the transaction after the new league year begins on March 12 and before his option bonus is due; if they do that, that cap hit would be decreased to $10,751,753 over the next two years.
“Deebo is under contract,” Lynch said then. “[He’s] a good player and has done a ton for this organization and we’re not in the business of letting good players out of here.”
But unlike Samuel’s 2022 trade request, the Niners are more inclined to part ways him this time around. Samuel’s previous request came when he was going through contract negotiations with the 49ers. When those discussions were slow to materialize, Samuel grew frustrated and asked to be dealt.
At the time, Samuel was coming off his best season, nearly leading the Niners to a Super Bowl appearance, and he was viewed as a key part of the team’s future. San Francisco never seriously entertained offers for Samuel then and ultimately signed him to a three-year, $71.5 million extension in August 2022.
This time, Samuel, 29, is coming off arguably his worst season, with 806 scrimmage yards and four touchdowns (both career lows save for a 2020 season in which he played just seven games).
During one four-game stretch late in the season against Seattle, Green Bay, Buffalo and Chicago, Samuel had just 97 yards from scrimmage on 17 touches, finishing with 21, 21, 20 and 35 yards in those games. It was the first time Samuel failed to have at least 50 yards from scrimmage in four straight games since a five-game stretch in his rookie season of 2019.
On Dec. 9, one day after the game against the Bears, Samuel vented on social media, writing in a since-deleted post on X that he was “Not struggling at all just not getting the ball!”
When asked about the post the next day, Samuel said, “You read what you read. [I’m] a little frustrated for sure.”
The 49ers selected Samuel with a second-round pick in the 2019 draft, and his versatility quickly allowed him to become a sparkplug for their offense.
Samuel’s ability to play running back became prominent in 2021, when he finished with 77 receptions for 1,405 yards and six touchdowns to go with 59 carries for 365 yards and eight more scores on his way to first-team All-Pro honors. That season, Samuel became just the third player in NFL history to have 1,000 receiving yards with at least five touchdowns rushing and five more receiving.
Samuel has 334 receptions for 4,792 yards and 22 touchdowns, along with 202 carries for 1,143 rushing yards and 20 touchdowns in his career. Those 20 rushing scores are the most by a wide receiver since at least 1960.
The 49ers began planning for the the real possibility that Samuel was entering his final season with the team last offseason, when they used the No. 31 pick in the draft to select receiver Ricky Pearsall. The Niners also signed receivers Brandon Aiyuk (four years, $120 million) and Jauan Jennings (two years, $15.39 million) to contract extensions.
Aiyuk is recovering from a torn ACL and MCL in his right knee, but he, Pearsall and Jennings are expected to be the team’s top three options at the position if Samuel is dealt, though they also figure to be in the market to add at the position this offseason, given that Aiyuk is coming off an injury, Pearsall is still largely unproven and Jennings is entering the final year of his deal.
Samuel’s trade request also adds another layer of drama to what is an important offseason in San Francisco. The 49ers will be looking to deal Samuel while working on a mega-contract extension for quarterback Brock Purdy and another deal for star tight end George Kittle.
