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49ers Have NFL's 12th-Best Offensive Line per Pro Football Focus

This seems generous.
Grant Cohn|
Jun 10, 2025; Santa Clara, CA, USA; San Francisco 49ers offensive tackle Trent Williams (71) reacts to a blocking drill during an OTA at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images
Jun 10, 2025; Santa Clara, CA, USA; San Francisco 49ers offensive tackle Trent Williams (71) reacts to a blocking drill during an OTA at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images | D. Ross Cameron-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

This seems generous.

When the 49ers lose and Brock Purdy struggles, the offensive line usually takes the blame. And that's because it's Trent Williams, Dominick Puni and not much else.

And yet, Pro Football Focus ranks the 49ers' offensive line 12th in the NFL out of 32 teams.

"Trent Williams remains the leader of San Francisco's line, but the soon-to-be 37-year-old won't be able to do so forever," writes PFF's Zoltan Buday. "For the first time in five seasons, he ranked outside the top two offensive tackles in PFF overall grade (85.6) this past year. Williams also missed significant time due to injury.

"The 49ers' group is still above average, especially considering Dominick Puni’s emergence. The Kansas product ranked sixth among all guards with an 80.5 PFF overall grade as a rookie."

Those are the two good offensive linemen on the team. Everyone else is questionable at best. Right tackle Colton McKivitz has given up 21 sacks last season despite the 49ers giving him help on almost every play. Center Jake Brendel will turn 33 in September and beginning to decline.

And the right guard is Ben Bartch, who has started only 10 games the past three seasons. He might not make it through the whole year.

And then there's Williams, who hasn't played a full season since 2013. Last season, he missed seven games. And his backup, Jaylon Moore, signed with the Chiefs this offseason. His replacement is Spencer Burford who played guard the first three seasons of his career.

On paper, the 49ers' offensive line is below average.

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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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