2026 Draft Grade

Originally posted by Memphis9er:
Black was an unknown to me, but after we picked him, I watched his highlights and I think he will start before James, who I don't think is the player Black is. One of the best things about both Black and Stribling is how good both are at blocking, which is a good sign they will get on the field sooner rather than later. I knew nothing about Cruz either, but I have been looking into him and he looks like something worth developing. I didn't hate the draft because I don't care one bit about mock drafts and some talking head's perceived value of a player. I look at the player and try to envision how they fit into what we do.

That's how Kyle and most good coaches do their player evaluations in this day and age, is to look at a players skill and see the fit and then draft the guy that fits their concepts. Now, teams can be built the other way too. You can get some very talented and athletic guys - like a Trent Williams or a CMC, and develop a scheme around their talent. I think thats where the reach-pick guys are comming from.

I'd like to change my grade to a C instead of the D or F i initially gave.

I'm ok with each player i just think each one was drafted a round early while also taking into consideration we picked at the end of each round except for our fist pick at 33.

If we look back at this class in 3 years i'd expect to see 1 starter and 4-5 key role players. Which is an ok draft, not great but certainly not bad. Very common with teams that pick towards the end of drafts.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
There's a lot of question marks, not just "the Black pick."

Why pass on Cooper to take Stribling 5 picks later? Stribling is a better blocker, but cooper gets open better.
Why pass on Lomu to take two more developmental tackles later? You could still take Cruz as a developmental project.
We didn't draft a IOL. 27 other teams in the nfl did.
Here is what skynet says about drafting IOL: Interior line depth is now treated as a must-fill every draft cycle

Kyle and Lynch can provide answers to these questions, but the fundamentally its clear we are picking the best players that fit our system, rather than adjusting the system to fit the best football players available.

I think draft order forces Kyle to do that. The top flight athletes go in day one and two of the draft. Guys like CMC and Trent Williams, they can fit into any system - zone run, gap-power, etc.. - because of their sheer athletic talent.

Kyle's drafting in the last quartile of the draft. He's not going to be able to pick the Nick Bosa, Trent, and CMC's year in and year out. He has to scheme fit the players like Brock Purdy, Raheem Mostert, and Brendel's.

These guys won't wow you with their sheer athleticism like a Fernando Mendoza, but these guys are athletic enough to make the zone run work, the short passing game work. For example, you don't need an offensive lineman to have a ton of power (like a Trent Williams) if most of your OLine blocking is screens, draws, and misdirection blocks. You can go with smaller more athletic OLinemen in that case.

P+

(=Pissed off A Lot Of Draftniks And "Influencers")

It's exactly the kind of draft I love. Weird and wonderful and annoying the types of people that I hold in contempt. If shouty youtubers, puffed-up gamblers posing as draftniks (Walter Football is my favourite), and 350-lb self righteous geeks who think they have found the formula to elite sporting success from their couch in their mother's basement get to froth in the mouth, that can only be A Good Thing.

I remember the year we picked that safety from Samford, the one with the flamboyant name who dropped that INT, name escapes me now. I loved how knickers were all bunched up in a twist throughout the Internets. He wasn't especially amazing and the team did go on to suck, but the righteous indignation of all those talking heads was a joy to behold.

I also love the annual doomed skill position pick (RB but occasionally TE like that Latte guy a couple of years back) in the 3rd or 4th round. Aka the Joe Williams Memorial Pick. Or perhaps the Holy Trey Sermon? Or even the Latte Round Pick? Anyway, it's consistently hilarious plus it injects an interesting plotline for training camp and preseason. Will the guy get cut before Week 1? Will he spend 2 seasons in the doghouse, THEN get traded for a conditional 2037 7th round pick? So much excitement!

Jimmy wards buddy jaquiski tartt

That's the one! But with the increasingly fractal first names for NFL players in recent year, plus my rapidly hardening brain cells, I forget even fantastic names like Jaquiski Tartt.

These arguments can go back and forth forever. The bottom line for me is that we again drafted skill positions before horses. Why? Based on some internal Dynamic that wants to keep everybody happy. I give this draft an F because we need to keep improving athletic quality and depth of our biggest players. The Way Seattle has done to find a winning formula.

Last year we gave up a billion points and had the worst run defense and pass rush in the NFL. Getting back Williams Bosa and Warner is only going to help partially. We need more depth up front and recommit to keeping players under 600 snaps even if they are getting paid $30M. We need to invest in bigs until one or two stand out and we can say " yeah, heres oir guy." That didnt happen last year with west or collins. So we try again. Its a mistake to assume its going to automatically happen year two.

We didnt do that and prioritized a blocking receiver who wont take targets awsy from evans or kirk and a guy who can spell cmc during blocking assignments. Sorry we lost the thread there.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
These arguments can go back and forth forever. The bottom line for me is that we again drafted skill positions before horses. Why? Based on some internal Dynamic that wants to keep everybody happy. I give this draft an F because we need to keep improving athletic quality and depth of our biggest players. The Way Seattle has done to find a winning formula.

Last year we gave up a billion points and had the worst run defense and pass rush in the NFL. Getting back Williams Bosa and Warner is only going to help partially. We need more depth up front and recommit to keeping players under 600 snaps even if they are getting paid $30M. We need to invest in bigs until one or two stand out and we can say " yeah, heres oir guy." That didnt happen last year with west or collins. So we try again. Its a mistake to assume its going to automatically happen year two.

We didnt do that and prioritized a blocking receiver who wont take targets awsy from evans or kirk and a guy who can spell cmc during blocking assignments. Sorry we lost the thread there.

im sorry what are you talking about we have completely remade the DL in 2 years

Last year Collins and West were the depth to be mixed in but our team got injured especially to the DL to the point where they were pretty much our only DT on the roster. This year we traded for Osa and then drafted Halton

The idea that you wanted to draft a DT in arguably the weakest DT class i can remember is pretty wild. And i do believe this is our best DL since 2019. I like our depth ansd starters at EDGE and DT

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
These arguments can go back and forth forever. The bottom line for me is that we again drafted skill positions before horses. Why? Based on some internal Dynamic that wants to keep everybody happy. I give this draft an F because we need to keep improving athletic quality and depth of our biggest players. The Way Seattle has done to find a winning formula.

Last year we gave up a billion points and had the worst run defense and pass rush in the NFL. Getting back Williams Bosa and Warner is only going to help partially. We need more depth up front and recommit to keeping players under 600 snaps even if they are getting paid $30M. We need to invest in bigs until one or two stand out and we can say " yeah, heres oir guy." That didnt happen last year with west or collins. So we try again. Its a mistake to assume its going to automatically happen year two.

We didnt do that and prioritized a blocking receiver who wont take targets awsy from evans or kirk and a guy who can spell cmc during blocking assignments. Sorry we lost the thread there.

You're the exact type of person who needs to listen to Cosell's knbr interview. You've lost the plot and are operating on bad information.

A) Our run defense was not worst in NFL

B) Our pass rush was addressed with 3 of our first 5 picks: Osa (trade), Height, and Halton. Pair them with growth to Collins/West, and health with Williams/Bosa and we have some thoroughbreds on the dline. This will be the biggest year over year positional improvement. Not really sure what your argument here is.

C) Black and Stribling are far more than just blockers (this is where listening to Cosell will help), but blocking will help them earn Kyle's trust. Each of these players are dangerous with the ball in their hands, homerun threats.

Originally posted by miked1978:
I'd like to change my grade to a C instead of the D or F i initially gave.

I'm ok with each player i just think each one was drafted a round early while also taking into consideration we picked at the end of each round except for our fist pick at 33.

If we look back at this class in 3 years i'd expect to see 1 starter and 4-5 key role players. Which is an ok draft, not great but certainly not bad. Very common with teams that pick towards the end of drafts.

This year there wasn't much difference between 2nd, 3rd and 4th round talent. The dropoff was pretty steep after the first half of round one. More than there usually is.

Draft grades are f**king stupid AF there's absolutely no point. None of these guys have played a single damn snap in the NFL yet.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
These arguments can go back and forth forever. The bottom line for me is that we again drafted skill positions before horses. Why? Based on some internal Dynamic that wants to keep everybody happy. I give this draft an F because we need to keep improving athletic quality and depth of our biggest players. The Way Seattle has done to find a winning formula.

Last year we gave up a billion points and had the worst run defense and pass rush in the NFL. Getting back Williams Bosa and Warner is only going to help partially. We need more depth up front and recommit to keeping players under 600 snaps even if they are getting paid $30M. We need to invest in bigs until one or two stand out and we can say " yeah, heres oir guy." That didnt happen last year with west or collins. So we try again. Its a mistake to assume its going to automatically happen year two.

We didnt do that and prioritized a blocking receiver who wont take targets awsy from evans or kirk and a guy who can spell cmc during blocking assignments. Sorry we lost the thread there.

Buwahahahaha. Such a drama queen. You continue to contradict yourself with your misinformation. Without bringing the receipts. We were middle of the road on a defense that was badly hurt. If you don't think providing they are healthy, that having Warner, Bosa and Williams won't make much difference or that West and Collins can't improve and make the jump, that is sad. Plus the two did improve at the end of the season according to the stats. Not only that, we traded for Osa from the Cowgirls. You also neglected to consider, that their will be changes with a new Coordinator. Morris could be worse, better or maybe just different.
The players we drafted and UDFA we signed and people we picked up suggest different

I posted about how despite what you said, the niners draft this year ranked 5th Athletically (RAS)-go do actual research.

How do you know that Kirk will have more playing time than Stribling? It is not just his blocking. He is faster, bigger and stronger than Kirk. Making such predictions without yet seeing the depth chart is also silly. X, Y, and Z. Other? While I like Malachi, he got draft early. They needed a DPR like Height, Dee ford type, that hopefully won't be as injury prone.

The San Francisco 49ers' 2026 NFL draft class was defined by high athleticism, with an average Relative Athletic Score (RAS) of 9.14, ranking 5th out of 32 NFL teams. The 8-player class included five players with a RAS above 9.00, headlined by 5th-round OT Enrique Cruz Jr. (9.87) and 2nd-round WR De'Zhaun Stribling (9.54).

2026 49ers Draft Class RAS Highlights
Average Class RAS: 9.14 (Ranked 5th in NFL).Highest RAS: OT Enrique Cruz Jr. (9.87). Key Pick: WR De'Zhaun Stribling (9.54).Lowest RAS: OG Carver Willis (7.93).Focus: The team focused on high-testing players to inject athleticism into the roster.

The class was largely lauded for its athleticism, with analysts noting that the team targeted elite physical traits, particularly in the middle rounds, despite some criticism of the overall draft strategy. Meaning they did not lock in on a position that OTHERs thought they should.

I gave it a C. I like the Halton and Height picks. They'll help out the pass rush.

Barring injuries I'm not expecting much from the wideout and runningback they selected. The guys they took fifth round it's going to be an uphill battle for them to make the team.

Originally posted by brodiebluebanaszak:
These arguments can go back and forth forever. The bottom line for me is that we again drafted skill positions before horses. Why? Based on some internal Dynamic that wants to keep everybody happy. I give this draft an F because we need to keep improving athletic quality and depth of our biggest players. The Way Seattle has done to find a winning formula.

Last year we gave up a billion points and had the worst run defense and pass rush in the NFL. Getting back Williams Bosa and Warner is only going to help partially. We need more depth up front and recommit to keeping players under 600 snaps even if they are getting paid $30M. We need to invest in bigs until one or two stand out and we can say " yeah, heres oir guy." That didnt happen last year with west or collins. So we try again. Its a mistake to assume its going to automatically happen year two.

We didnt do that and prioritized a blocking receiver who wont take targets awsy from evans or kirk and a guy who can spell cmc during blocking assignments. Sorry we lost the thread there.

This.