49ers 2019 free agency needs: Revisiting 5 players San Francisco should avoid
By Peter Panacy
No. 2: Wide Receiver Devin Funchess
The Carolina Panthers are moving on from wide receiver Devin Funchess after taking him at No. 41 overall in the 2015 NFL Draft.
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Funchess, 6-foot-4 and 225 pounds, seems to embody the kind of wide receiver the 49ers would want. He’s tall, physical and would have a red-zone prowess — something of need, considering San Francisco’s red-zone offense was the league’s worst in 2018.
The thing, though, is Funchess never lived up to expectations in Carolina. Sure, his 840 receiving yards in 2017 is a sign of promise. But he also had repeated drops over that tenure, which is something that plagued San Francisco’s pass catchers the last two seasons, too.
Reliability and productivity is something Kyle Shanahan will want from his receivers moving forward. Funchess is nowhere close to fizzling out like another former big-bodied Panthers wideout, Kelvin Benjamin. But the former also isn’t worth a flier from San Francisco, either.
Plus, like the case with edge rushers, the 2019 NFL Draft is too deep to make Funchess a free-agent target.