Kyle Shanahan learned a painful lesson with 49ers' failed Jake Moody experiment

The San Francisco 49ers never should have used a third-round pick in the 2023 NFL Draft on a specialist, but they ultimately did, drafting Michigan kicker Jake Moody.

But that's not the lesson head coach Kyle Shanahan needed to learn in the wake of the Niners finally pulling the plug on the Moody experiment, news of which was reported by NFL Network's Tom Pelissero the Tuesday after the kicker's Week 1 debacle at the Seattle Seahawks.

After just two-plus seasons, which included a dreadful second half of 2024 in which his field-goal percentage was actually worse than the biggest kicking bust in recent memory, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers' Roberty Aguayo, Moody is gone:

So, what is the lesson Shanahan learned? And why is it vital going forward?

Kyle Shanahan's lesson on botched Jake Moody experiment

Fortunately, Moody's 1-of-3 line from Week 1 ultimately didn't cost San Francisco the game. But, had Moody stayed on the roster, it's almost inevitable he would have cost the 49ers games at some point.

Shanahan, who has long avoided special teams as "someone else's domain," would've previously rather worried more about finding an adequate kicker than worrying about his own kicker's effectiveness, essentially meaning he was denying the problem. In turn, this led to the notion the of a sunk-cost fallacy; the only justification for Moody staying on the roster after 2024's horrendous showing. Had the kicker been an undrafted free agent instead of a third-round pick, he would have been gone.

That's only part of the lesson, though.

A bigger aspect, perhaps, is the fact Shanahan ultimately risked alienating portions of his locker room by continuing to invest near-blind faith in Moody despite obvious objections, the most visible of which occurred with now-Washington Commanders wide receiver Deebo Samuel late last season when he got into a physical altercation with Moody's then-partner on special teams, long-snapper Taybor Pepper, following additional in-game misses by the kicker.

Shanahan should have realized at that point how Moody was beginning to fracture the locker room, and taking swift action at that point (or at least during the offseason) would have been preferred.

Fortunately for the head coach, he didn't opt to wait too long into 2025, nor did he wait for the Niners to lose a game because of a failed Moody kick.

Hopefully, that's a lesson Shanahan keeps close from this point forward.