Kyle Shanahan Emphasizes Patience With 49ers Rookies

Who would've thought Kyle Shanahan would be patient?

Jul 23, 2025; Santa Clara, CA, USA; San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan answers questions from reporters following the first day of training camp at SAP Performance Facility. Mandatory Credit: D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images | D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images

The San Francisco 49ers may have as many as eight rookie and second-year players starting for them on defense.

That’s where most of the young talent on the 49ers is allocated. It makes sense, considering the 49ers lost many players on defense and subsequently selected five defensive players with their first five draft picks. 

While it was necessary to retool the defense with young players, it also poses a significant risk. There’s no telling how long these players, especially the rookies, will take to round into form. 

And that’s assuming that some of them will ever become impactful players. There’s no guarantee that some or most of the rookies will ever pan out.

The only way for the 49ers to discover that is with time, and that’s exactly how Kyle Shanahan is viewing it.

“We've all been around enough to know that yeah, there's some growing pains with rookies, but there's growing pains with everyone,” said Shanahan. “You’ve got to understand though that rookies are going to struggle harder at first. They aren't going to figure it out right away. You can't just bench them as soon as they make a mistake early. That does take reps.”

One gripe with Shanahan as a head coach is that he’s never had much patience for rookies or young players. Last year, he was forced to play several rookies due to injuries. 

And while he’s still forced to play rookies and young players again, it seems Shanahan understands that time will be needed for the 49ers’ vision to come to fruition with them.

“No matter what you do, you need a lot of reps to get good at anything and these guys are going to need those reps. They haven't had them, they don't get them in the offseason. They get them through playing football and that's why you hope as they get those reps, they're not catastrophic because we're all judged on wins and losses. But there's some ebb and flows in it and if they're made of the right stuff, you can overcome those mistakes and they eventually fix them.”

So long as the rookies and young players aren't hindering the team's success significantly, they will be allowed to work through it.