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The 49ers Should Re-Sign Talanoa Hufanga this Offseason

The 49ers just might be able to keep Talanoa Hufanga after all.
Grant Cohn|
Oct 6, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers safety Talanoa Hufanga (29) before the game against the Arizona Cardinals at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images
Oct 6, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers safety Talanoa Hufanga (29) before the game against the Arizona Cardinals at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images | Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

The 49ers just might be able to keep Talanoa Hufanga after all.

For the past two years, they seemed to be under the assumption that they couldn't afford to re-sign Hufanga in 2025 because he was an All Pro in 2022, and All Pro safeties make more than $15 million per season. And the 49ers never have spent that much money on a safety since Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch have been with the organization.

That's why the 49ers traded up to draft safety Ji'Ayir Brown in Round 3 last year and took safety Malik Mustapha in Round 4 this year. They want to be covered at the position if/when Hufanga leaves next year.

So far this season, Mustapha looks promising. But Brown has been a massive disappointment -- he's having the dreaded sophomore slump. And there's no way to know if he'll bounce back.

Which brings us back to Hufanga. Suddenly, he's not nearly as expensive as the 49ers thought he would be at this point in his career. That's because he missed half of last season with a torn ACL and has missed most of this season with a wrist injury. So he hasn't played much since his All Pro season of 2022. And 2022 was a while ago.

It's possible the 49ers could re-sign Hufanga to a one-year deal this offseason as he looks to get healthy and regain his status as a premier safety in the NFL. And they absolutely should re-sign him to a one-year deal if he'll take it. Because he's so much better than the safeties they have.

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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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