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What Tristan Wirfs' Extension Means for 49ers LT Trent Williams

The question is whether the 49ers can afford a Williams extension in the long term, because they're also trying to extend Brandon Aiyuk and next year they will try to extend Brock Purdy. So they may not have earmarked $28 million per season for an aging yet excellent left tackle.

Grant Cohn

Feb 5, 2024; Las Vegas, NV, USA; San Francisco 49ers offensive tackle Trent Williams (71) talks to the media during Super Bowl LVIII Opening Night at Allegiant Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 5, 2024; Las Vegas, NV, USA; San Francisco 49ers offensive tackle Trent Williams (71) talks to the media during Super Bowl LVIII Opening Night at Allegiant Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports / Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports
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Trent Williams' price tag just went up.

That's because the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just gave left tackle Tristan Wirfs a five-year, $140 million extension. That's a whopping $28.1 million per season. And that's bad news for the 49ers.

Williams has held out all offseason because he wants a new deal. He has zero guaranteed money left on his current one, and his base salary for 2024 is roughly $20 million. So he's underpaid relative to the rest of the left tackle market, considering he's still the best left tackle in the NFL, even at 36 years old.

It hasn't been reported exactly what Williams is demanding from the 49ers, but it seems likely he wants to be paid like he's the best left tackle in the NFL. Which means a base salary that's roughly $28 million per season. That would be a massive raise for Williams, but the 49ers have more than $30 million in cap space for this season, so they can afford it in the short term.

The question is whether the 49ers can afford a Williams extension in the long term, because they're also trying to extend Brandon Aiyuk and next year they will try to extend Brock Purdy. So they may not have earmarked $28 million per season for an aging yet excellent left tackle.

I'm guessing the 49ers will work out an extension for Williams just before the season starts. There's not much urgency right now because Williams probably doesn't want to practice anyway. Expect a resolution to come in early September.

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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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