49ers dragged into Micah Parsons trade reaction for all the wrong reasons

This hurts.

Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

Somehow, the San Francisco 49ers are being dragged into the Micah Parsons trade news. In lieu of Parsons being dealt to the Green Bay Packers, Kristopher Knox of Bleacher Report ranked the eight most shocking trades. The 49ers are not going to like to hear that they came in at number one for their trade-up for Trey Lance. 

The San Francisco 49ers' choice to trade a massive set of picks to move up in the 2021 draft—without even knowing which quarterback would be available—was jaw-dropping.

San Francisco made a move up from 12th overall to third overall roughly a month before the draft. They did it by sending the 12th pick, a 2021 third-round pick and first-round picks in 2022 and 2023 to the Miami Dolphins.

Yes, Miami got more back for an unknown draft pick than the Cowboys just received for Parsons.

And San Francisco's target truly was a mystery. The 49ers ultimately settled on North Dakota State's Trey Lance, but there was plenty of smoke around Alabama's Mac Jones.

Kristopher Knox

Was Trey Lance the most shocking trade in NFL History?

Most old school 49ers fans may have wondered if Charles Haley was going to be brought up here, and fans can debate which decision set the franchise back worse. However, while the 49ers' decision to trade up was shocking, these trades do tend to happen at times. 

In fact, one trade that missed the cut was Washington moving up for Robert Griffin III. They went from six to two, a shorter jump than San Francisco did, and they traded more first-round picks than the 49ers did. 

Geoff Burke-Imagn Images

Funnily enough, both decisions involved Kyle Shanahan, and both decisions ended poorly. The Griffin trade does not make the list because he was a consensus stud at the time that the trade was made. He won the Heisman, and some said he would be better than Andrew Luck, who went first in that draft. 

The outcome was poor, the price was an overpay, but to this writer, it must have been justified. The writer really slams San Francisco for the decision-making process.

They knew that Trevor Lawrence was going first, and they were close enough to Robert Saleh to know Zach Wilson was going second. The debate was always Trey Lance or Mac Jones. According to this ranking, it was known at the time that neither would be a good pick, or that trading up and then debating the two was made the decision so shocking, compared to typical quarterback trade-ups. 

Trey Lance. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

While injuries were a key to Lance struggling as well, we saw Griffin succeed before the injuries, and we never saw anything from Lance. 

As far as one of the more mysterious outcomes of a career, and confusing ways for a top-three pick that was traded up for to go out, Lance is the easy answer. However, San Francisco needed a quarterback; they knew who was available, and they took a swing. 

This is a disappointing outcome, not a shocking trade. Teams trade multiple first-round picks all the time, and even if Griffin turned out good for one year, the price they paid was outrageous and looked back upon throughout the duration of his career. That was much more shocking at the time.