10 superstars 49ers could have drafted but unwisely didn’t

49ers 2010 draft re-do

Actual pick: Taylor Mays, S, USC – Rd 2, Pick 49

New pick: Carlos Dunlap, DE, Florida – Rd 2, Pick 54 (Cincinnati)

San Francisco’s 2010 draft was actually a fairly decent one across the board. The team picked up Idaho guard Mike Iupati (No. 17 overall), who would be a staple of a solid offensive line for years and got a steal in the third round with Penn State linebacker NaVorro Bowman (91st overall), and used one of three sixth-round picks to snag Mississippi State running back Anthony Dixon (173rd overall).

There were some misses, however, the most obvious of which was picking up USC safety Taylor Mays in the second round when other players were on the board.

Mays played just one season for the 49ers, starting six games at strong safety but mostly featuring as a special teams player, where he returned a blocked punt for a touchdown in Week 4 against the Falcons.

He was traded to the Bengals in August of 2011 for a 2013 seventh-round pick, where he’d end up playing four seasons before being cut by Cincy and bouncing around the league, ending his career as a Raider after one season in 2015.

It’s safe to say the return on investment for the second-round pick was not an ideal one.

The field around Mays, to be fair, isn’t packed with tons of options, with players like Stanford running back Toby Gerhart (51st to the Vikings), Penn State linebacker Sean Lee (55th to the Bengals), and Notre Dame wideout Golden Tate (60th to the Seahawks) all in the mix.

Instead, let’s go with a solid if unspectacular replacement in former Florida pass-rusher Carlos Dunlap, who carved out a nice career for himself since being drafted in 2010.

He’ll enter his 14th NFL season in 2022 with the Seahawks, who acquired him for a seventh-round draft pick from the Bengals in 2020. During his tenure in the league, Dunlap has played 180 games, tallying up 539 tackles, 96 sacks, forcing 21 fumbles, and even pulling down two interceptions.

For a second-round pick, you couldn’t ask for a whole lot more.

To be sure, Dunlap fits a different role than Mays did, but if he could have stepped into the defense and made the same impact he did in Cincinnati, then the position might not have mattered all that much.