After all the bro-hugs, TikTok posts, trade requests, trade threats, social-media red alerts, bluffs, feints and passive-aggressive hold-in prickliness, the San Francisco 49ers and Brandon Aiyuk finally came to terms on an extremely rational and very necessary four-year, $120 million deal on Thursday.
Yes, the weirdest negotiation ever produced possibly the most sensible big deal of this 49ers era, just in time for Aiyuk to get up to speed for the Sept. 9 opener against the New York Jets. Cause and effect? Did it have to get this bizarre, building up to Wednesday’s practice-or-else showdown and then Thursday’s breakthrough, for this smart deal to be consummated at last? Well, maybe.
Sometimes, these deals are relatively straightforward. Nick Bosa’s negotiations were prolonged last year, but both sides knew he wasn’t going to sign until the 49ers offered him exactly what he thought he was worth, and when that number was hit, he signed. Let’s just presume those are the same conditions facing the 49ers and Trent Williams in his holdout right now. And sometimes, these situations are decided quickly. The 49ers took one look at DeForest Buckner’s contract requests back in 2020 and quickly traded him to the Indianapolis Colts.
But the Aiyuk talks were not straightforward. They sure weren’t quick. They were confusing to watch and, from everything that’s been reported and everything I’ve heard, they were confusing to be a part of, too. The 49ers’ negotiators didn’t really understand what Aiyuk was doing and were less than enthralled with his social-media adventures. Meanwhile, Aiyuk’s camp was endlessly frustrated with the 49ers’ hardline negotiating style. And maybe the two sides needed to produce some shocks to find out if the other was really paying attention.
The end result is what matters, of course. All sides knew that Aiyuk’s best fit was with the 49ers and that if he departed, the 49ers would almost certainly replace him with a far less talented receiver. I don’t think Aiyuk ever really wanted to be traded to the Pittsburgh Steelers, though that’s what he wanted people to believe. I don’t think the 49ers ever really wanted to trade him anywhere, though they told Aiyuk’s camp that they were all too ready to pull the trigger with several teams.
This deal, as reported, seems almost identical to the four-year, $120 million deal that Detroit gave to Amon-Ra St. Brown in April. That deal had $77 million in guarantees. Aiyuk’s reportedly has $76 million. Both have annual average salaries of $30 million, which lands squarely in the top five among WR deals, ranking just ahead of Tyreek Hill and below Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb and A.J. Brown.
Who “won” this deal? It’s hard to tell. For now, let’s call it a tie, because it all makes sense. This is the deal that has made sense for Aiyuk and the 49ers ever since St. Brown signed. This is the same deal that, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, has been on the table from the 49ers since Aug. 13. Jed York and Paraag Marathe offered enough money. Aiyuk signed for what he’s worth.
So why did it take so long? Why did this have to get a little mean and a little out of control? Why did this come so close to a divorce, presumably all the way up to Thursday morning, when Aiyuk missed his second consecutive practice after the 49ers deemed he was healthy enough to participate?
My guess is that this just was an unfortunate clash of styles and personalities, which is odd, since Aiyuk’s agent, Ryan Williams, is a friend and business associate of John Lynch. But remember when Aiyuk was in Kyle Shanahan’s doghouse back in 2021 and nobody could really figure out why for several weeks? Aiyuk is a well-respected member of the 49ers’ locker room, but he also can be quite cryptic. Unlike his good friend Deebo Samuel, whose feelings are never cloaked, Aiyuk can be hard to read. Even for coaches.
But Aiyuk bounced back from that period and started playing his very best football for Shanahan and the 49ers. I suspect there will be a similar result after these months of strain. I also can guess there will be another episode like this somewhere down the road. It just seems to be a part of the Aiyuk-49ers story.
In this instance, Marathe is not renowned for being an empathetic negotiator. He’s great at his job and has “won” more than his share of big-time negotiations for the 49ers. But in this negotiation, with a stubborn wide receiver that the 49ers absolutely could not afford to lose, things got off-line fast and never got on-line until the very end of this. And the logical offer they could’ve made in April wasn’t made until Aug. 13, let’s point that out.
GO DEEPER
49ers, Brandon Aiyuk agree to 4-year extension
It took a major jolt from the 49ers, playing extreme hardball at the 11th hour, to get this deal done. They needed it done right now. They couldn’t have Aiyuk around the building, healthy but refusing to practice, into next week, when full-scale preparations will begin for the Jets game. They couldn’t hold a roster spot for him if he wasn’t going to get ready to play. They needed an answer. Things got direct. And they finally got their answer on Thursday.
I give York, Marathe and Lynch credit for this — they could’ve pulled the $120 million offer earlier this week, and they didn’t, but they did seem to be threatening unnamed dire consequences into the future. Of course, if the challenge to Aiyuk this week had blown up in their faces, I would’ve had a very different conclusion. But they got the deal done and they finished up their weirdest negotiation with a very fair agreement.
I also don’t believe this deal, as rich as it is, seriously hurts the 49ers’ future salary-cap situation. They were always going to have to pay near the top of the market to retain Aiyuk through his prime years, just like they’ve done with Bosa, Fred Warner, George Kittle and Christian McCaffrey. They’ll have to do it again, likely at nearly double the Aiyuk numbers, for Brock Purdy when he’s eligible for an extension next offseason. It might lead to discarding Deebo next offseason, which actually was calculated years ago, when they signed Deebo to his easily exited deal.
But also, large guarantees can push down the early cap costs. St. Brown’s cap hit for this season, for instance, is just $4.9 million. The cap jeopardy comes if a player with large guarantees doesn’t retain his value into the third or fourth seasons of the deal, when the hits spike high and the exit costs spike higher. Aiyuk, at 26, seems ideally suited to be just as valuable or more in 2027 — when the 49ers will absolutely want to have as many great receivers available to catch Purdy’s passes — as he is right now.
So it’s a good deal for both sides that easily could’ve happened months ago, but circumstances and personalities prevented this. Presumably, Shanahan, Lynch, Marathe, York and Aiyuk will engage in some celebratory hugs and cheeriness over the next few days, and they deserve the moments, if they are all in the mood for it. But hopefully they will be off-camera and, for the sake of us all, nowhere near social media.
(Photo of Brandon Aiyuk: Michael Owens / Getty Images)
