After San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan decided to cancel his team’s mandatory minicamp, some Washington Commanders fans theorized the Niners cancelled it so disgruntled wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk couldn’t report to camp, which likely would have led to San Francisco releasing him outright.
It was a bizarre conspiracy from jump, but it’s been proven as complete lunacy now after Los Angeles Rams head coach Sean McVay decided to cancel LA’s mandatory minicamp as well.
Obviously, with both the Niners and Rams set to square off in Australia for Week 1, both coaches seem to recognize the fact that getting rest is the most important thing for their respective teams ahead of that matchup. For San Francisco, it’s even more important since it'll have to play in Mexico City later in the year, and the travel schedule is going to be insane.
But the notion the Niners were ever cancelling minicamp simply to spite Aiyuk was always a crazy idea. Are the 49ers still holding onto Aiyuk partly out of spite for his erratic attention-seeking behavior that has been a distraction for the team? Almost certainly.
Yet Shanahan was never going to make decisions based around Aiyuk and his behavior. He cares about winning first and foremost, certainly more than petty squabbles, so he’s purely making a football decision with the minicamp cancellation.
It’s interesting the way some of these Commanders fans have responded even though some more responsible voices have called out that talk as delusional. But these fans in question seem to agree with Aiyuk’s unhinged ramblings that the Niners are scared of letting Aiyuk go because they know he’s going to go off with another team.
Aiyuk clearly wants to go to Washington. His social media behavior and choice of hat has made that abundantly clear, and it seems a decent chunk of Commanders fans want him there as well.
Maybe if they want him so bad, they should petition Commanders general manager Adam Peters to do anything to get a wide receiver whose behavior has been erratic and whose knee may not be ready to play football because of his refusal to rehab in accordance with his current employer. Oh yeah, and he hasn’t played in a game since 2024. If these fans demand Peters trade a fifth-round pick to the Niners in exchange for Aiyuk, he may have no other choice.
But in all seriousness, the Aiyuk talk and theories have reached insane levels. There will surely be some great tell-all about this someday in a book, but for now, we just have to count down the days until Aiyuk is no longer with the Niners.
Add us as a preferred source on Google