Why 49ers hold leverage in Brandon Aiyuk contract talks
There’s an aspect of the Brandon Aiyuk-49ers contract discussions that doesn’t come up much when discussing whether he’ll stay with San Francisco. It isn’t as black and white as ‘he stays on a long-term extension or gets traded,’ and that’s because the team holds virtually all of the leverage.
Aiyuk is under contract for the 2024 season because the 49ers picked up the fifth-year option on his rookie deal. San Francisco would surely like to get a deal done to lock the All-Pro WR in for the next few seasons. They don’t have to though.
The 49ers could decide to let Aiyuk play out the final year of his rookie contract and then franchise tag him next year. The aggregate total of those two years would land just over $38 million since his fifth-year option is $14ish million and the projected franchise tag number on Over the Cap is sitting at just above $24 million.
If Aiyuk decides not to play in 2024, he won’t accrue a season and he’ll be right back in the same spot next year without having gotten paid for the 2024 campaign. It seems like a stretch that he’d rather do this than ink a deal or run the risk of getting hurt and damaging his long-term value. And that’s what the 49ers are banking on.
The team can sit back and wait because if they do nothing this year, they have Aiyuk under contract, and then they can utilize a franchise tag to keep him around another year. Their hope is that as training camp draws closer and Aiyuk starts standing to lose money for missing those practices that he’ll come down on whatever his number is to ink that long-term deal that gives him security over the next few seasons.
There’s some risk in this for the 49ers though. Aiyuk would likely cost more against the cap if they do the fifth-year plus the franchise tag. And if he keeps performing well his price will only go up. That’s where the team will have to be flexible in coming up from whatever their number is to try and meet Aiyuk in the middle.
San Francisco has the leverage though, but it does come with some risk. That’s true for both sides, which is why by the time camp rolls around we should see some kind of action where Aiyuk signs a deal that pays him like one of the league’s 5 or 8 best receivers.
