The San Francisco 49ers might be heading into the 2026 season as a top playoff contender, but that doesn’t mean everything went perfectly over the offseason.
One of the biggest moves that the 49ers received criticism for was their decision to draft De’Zhuan Stribling with the No. 33 overall pick. It was an odd move from a consensus perspective with Denzel Boston still on the board. But that wasn’t their worst move.
ESPN’s Bill Barnwell instead identified the 49ers’ draft pick of Kaelon Black in the third round as the worst decision made by the 49ers this offseason.
49ers’ Kaelon Black draft pick receives criticism
“Worst: Using a third-round pick on Kaelon Black,” Barnwell writes. “Even coach Kyle Shanahan admits that he has a bad habit of taking middle-round running backs who don’t work out.”
Even though Kyle Shanahan is one of the best coaches in the entire NFL, offense or defense, the number of times they’ve made this same move is astounding.
This year, they took Black in Round 3 to be a potential backup for Christian McCaffrey. He might not see the field much, if at all, this upcoming season. For the 90th overall pick, that is a huge mistake.
But it doesn’t stop there. This same mistake has been routinely made over the last decade or so for the 49ers, regardless of how good the RB room is, or where the team is in their rebuild.
In 2025, the 49ers took Jordan James in the fifth round. In 2024, the 49ers took Isaac Guerendo in the fourth-round. They skipped taking an RB in 2023, but in 2022, they took Tyrion Davis-Price in Round 3.
In 2021, they took Trey Sermon in Round 3, and back in 2017, Shanahan’s first year as head coach, they took Joe Williams in the fourth-round.
Since Shanahan has taken over, across 10 draft classes, the 49ers have used at least a fifth and at most a third round pick to draft a running back six times.
That’s way too often for a team to be drafting a running back with a relatively premium selection. Barnwell called the Black pick the worst decision of the offseason, and for good reason.
It wasn’t simply just because it was a reach, which it certainly was, but because the 49ers have made this same mistake over and over again. To see Shanahan and John Lynch not learn from their mistakes has got to be agonizing for 49ers fans.
