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The 49ers Should Trade Up in the NFL Draft

The 49ers need to consolidate some of those picks, and what better way to do that than to trade up?
Grant Cohn|
The 49ers Should Trade Up in the NFL Draft
The 49ers Should Trade Up in the NFL Draft

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San Francisco 49ers

Something doesn't add up.

The 49ers have 11 picks in the draft -- all after pick No. 98 -- and they also have one of the best rosters in the NFL. We're supposed to believe somehow that 11 rookies will make an elite roster this year.

Seems unrealistic.

The 49ers are much too talented to find roster spots for all those youngsters. They need to consolidate some of those picks, and what better way to do that than to trade up?

The NFL recently awarded the 49ers three compensatory picks at the end of Round 3 -- pick Nos. 99, 101 and 102. These picks essentially are free money for the 49ers. Theoretically, they could package them together in a trade and move up to the end of Round 2, according to the classic trade value chart.

This could be an appealing trade for the 49ers, because they stand to lose a few starters when free agency starts this week: right tackle Mike McGlinchey, center Jake Brendel, cornerback Emmanuel Moseley, nickelback Jimmie Ward, free safety Tashaun Gipson, linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair, defensive lineman Charles Omenihu and defensive lineman Samson Ebukam.

The 49ers will fill some of those holes in free agency, but also probably will need to draft a rookie who will have to start right away, and it's easier to find a plug-and-play rookie at the end of Round 2 than at the end of Round 3.

Last year, the 49ers made zero trades in the draft. Two years ago, they traded up for Trey Lance and Trey Sermon. Sermon got cut last season, and Lance still has started only four games. Perhaps the 49ers are afraid to trade up again, but they really should. They don't need 11 rookies.

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Grant Cohn
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.

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