San Francisco 49ers: 5 key storylines to watch in 2020 offseason
By Peter Panacy
The San Francisco 49ers will go through a quite different offseason in 2020 after coming up short in Super Bowl LIV, and Niner Noise looks at key storylines to watch.
For the last three offseasons under head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch, the San Francisco 49ers‘ efforts were almost entirely centered on the rebuild stemming from what was a 2-16 squad way back in 2016.
Now, entering 2020, Lynch and Shanahan’s Niners are coming off a narrow Super Bowl loss to the Kansas City Chiefs. And as disappointing as that was for the franchise and its fans, it’s far too premature to assume San Francisco’s Super Bowl window is closed.
If anything, it just started to open up.
That said, the 49ers enter an offseason unlike any of the others under Lynch and Shanahan’s leadership. The team is now faced with some tough, tough NFL free agency decisions with some of their best contributors from 2019. Two key trades from last year — moving a second-round NFL Draft pick for EDGE Dee Ford and then a third- and fourth-round pick for wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders — cut into San Francisco’s stockpile of picks for the 2020 draft.
Star players like tight end George Kittle and defensive tackle DeForest Buckner are also due contract extensions, and the Niners have a limited amount of salary cap space to make a lot of splash moves on the open market while also taking care of their own players.
Needless to say, 2020 should provide a very interesting offseason at the team’s headquarters in Santa Clara.
With that as a backdrop, Niner Noise dives deep into what should be some important, key storylines for the 49ers between now and the start of training camp later this summer.