NFL.com Says the 49ers Should Re-Sign Dre Greenlaw to a One-Year Deal

Grant Cohn | Feb 4, 2025

Feb 6, 2024; Las Vegas, NV, USA; San Francisco 49ers linebacker Dre Greenlaw (57) during a press conference before Super Bowl LVIII at the Hilton Lake Las Vegas Resort. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images / Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

The 49ers have to make up significant ground in the NFC this offseason.

They're coming off a six-win season during which they won just one game in their division. The freaking Cardinals beat the 49ers twice. Think about that. They need to do something big.

And according to NFL.com, that big move is re-signing linebacker Dre Greenlaw to a one-year deal.

"In one half of football, Greenlaw proved his importance to San Francisco's defense," writes NFL.com analyst Kevin Patra. "The Niners collapsed in the second half against the L.A. Rams in Week 15 and lost out the rest of the way, including getting run over by Jahmyr Gibbs in Week 17. Why do I have the feeling that wouldn't have happened the same way if Greenlaw had been on the field? His sideline-to-sideline ability is so vital next to Fred Warner that it elevates the entire operation. The linebacker was just coming into his own the last time Robert Saleh was on the sideline in the Bay Area. A one-year contract makes sense for both sides. Greenlaw can prove he's healthy before truly hitting the open market in 2026 at 28 years old, and the LB can help the Niners go from worst to first in the NFC West."

Re-signing Greenlaw to an affordable one-year deal sounds like a no-brainer. Because when he's healthy, he's one of the best linebackers in the NFL. But he couldn't stay healthy for a full game this season and he'll turn 28 in May. It's possible he'll miss lots more time with injuries. And that means Greenlaw might not be the missing piece that brings the 49ers back to contention. Even if they sign him, they have to draft a linebacker just in case.

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Published Feb 4, 2025

GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.