San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan joined the Rich Eisen Show on Monday morning and discussed the team's interest in Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers leading to the draft. Really, it was just the team doing its due diligence, but it was a hot rumor that made for some interesting discussion leading to the draft.
"The exact truth is I didn't want to wake up the next day, on Friday, and see Aaron Rodgers, one of the best quarterbacks in this league, traded, without doing any due diligence on it," Shanahan explained to Eisen (h/t to Cam Inman of Bay Area News Group). "So I just called Matt and asked him if there was anything to it, and Matt told me I'd be wasting my time if we had Lynch call.
"And so Lynch did not call anyone the next day. But, yeah, I did reach out to Matt the night before and asked him, 'Hey man, I don't want to wake up the next day and see that Aaron was traded for something, and I didn't at least look into it.' So, that's what I did with Matt, and he gave me a very quick answer.
"So, I didn't even tell John to call [Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst]. So I think it worked out, I guess. We were happy to get our guy, and hopefully, it will work out for them."
Did @49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan really call the #Packers to see if @AaronRodgers12 really was available?#NFL #NFLDraft #49ers pic.twitter.com/g6jr9YPTz2
— Rich Eisen Show (@RichEisenShow) May 3, 2021
One report stated that Rodgers, seemingly desperate for a change of scenery, wanted the Packers to accept the 49ers' offer and even felt that he might be headed to the Bay Area. It never got that far, though.
The 49ers ended up selecting Trey Lance of North Dakota State with the No. 3 overall pick. He will enter training camp as Jimmy Garoppolo's backup but is the future for the franchise.
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