SF 49ers news: NFL.com mock draft gives Niners O-line help

The SF 49ers could use some help along their offensive line, and that’s what NFL.com’s latest mock NFL Draft has them doing this April.

So much of what the SF 49ers end up doing in this year’s NFL Draft will be predicated on the challenging decisions to be made in free agency.

Particularly with veteran perennial Pro Bowl left tackle Trent Williams.

Williams is going to be one of the Niners’ top re-sign targets. But with him likely to command something in the range of $18 million annually, it’ll be tough for San Francisco to keep Williams on anything other than a team-friendly or back-loaded deal to account for the diminished salary cap in 2021.

And even if Williams re-signs, the SF 49ers could stand for some offensive line reinforcements anyway.

That’s what NFL.com’s Daniel Jeremiah speculated would happen in his most recent mock draft, as he now has the Niners grabbing Northwestern offensive tackle Rashawn Slater at No. 12 overall:

"We’ll see what happens with Trent Williams in free agency, but even if the Niners are able to re-sign him, Slater could easily slide inside to guard."

Slater, 6-foot-4 and 314 pounds, did excellent work in 2019 against former Ohio State EDGE Chase Young, who ended up becoming the league’s Defensive Rookie of the Year with the Washington Football Team in 2020. Those efforts, combined with Slater’s versatility, were one of the reasons why Niner Noise listed the up-and-coming lineman as a dark-horse candidate for San Francisco’s top pick this April.

How Rashawn Slater fits an SF 49ers need

Losing Williams would be a big blow, at least right away as the SF 49ers don’t have any on-roster options, currently, to replace him.

But as Jeremiah pointed out, even if Williams is retained, the Niners could do much worse than transition Slater inside to guard. One of the areas San Francisco could stand to upgrade is at right guard where the trio of Daniel Brunskill, Tom Compton and Colton McKivitz was a revolving door that never quite materialized into anything effective. And over the long run, Slater could end up being a quality starter at either tackle spot, potentially replacing Williams or, at least in a year or two’s time, allowing the SF 49ers to move on from right tackle Mike McGlinchey.

The Niners have spent considerable effort reinforcing both sides of the line of scrimmage early in the NFL Draft, and McGlinchey’s selection in Round 1 back in 2018 was a prime example.

It wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to see Slater fall into a similar category, too.