On Tuesday, All-Pro tight end George Kittle joined the Bussin' With The Boys Podcast and was asked specifically what all went down between the San Francisco 49ers and disgruntled wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk.
Asking to speak freely, Kittle went into detail about how the relationship between receiver and team seemed to deteriorate slowly over the summer of 2025 and into the regular season.
But there was no single moment where it appeared as if Aiyuk and the Niners were destined for a split. According to the tight end, Aiyuk was around the facility, albeit not always consistently, and the two would have interactions in the weight room where Aiyuk was doing his recovery.
That was until November of last year, though.
That month, The Athletic's Mike Silver and Dianna Russini broke a report of how San Francisco voided guarantees on Aiyuk's contract for 2026, likely resulting from him failing to meet obligations in his contract and suggesting a release would happen the following offseason.
After that, Aiyuk went full AWOL, and Kittle never saw him again.
"Literally, a week later, that story came out. All the crazy stuff," Kittle said. "And then, I didn't see him again."
It's the same story echoed by head coach Kyle Shanahan, too, who said the receiver was unreachable after that point.
But something doesn't quite add up.
Why did Brandon Aiyuk choose The Athletic's report as his moment to go AWOL?
According to Silver and Russini, the 49ers voided Aiyuk's guarantees over the previous summer, and it was clear he knew fully well what was going on because he opted not to fight the contractual adjustment; an interesting development in of itself.
So, it wasn't as if The Athletic's report told Aiyuk something new. He was fully aware what was going on that November. And that might help explain why the wideout was a "sometimes" participant at training camp.
But it doesn't explain the ghosting a few months later.
Perhaps Aiyuk felt slighted about an in-house issue going public, news of which could damage his reputation as a would-be free agent in 2026. Or, possibly, it was the last straw in a long line of contentuous faceoffs with the Niners that dated back to his high-intensity extension talks during the 2024 offseason.
Without knowing the source of Silver and Russini's intel, it's hard to say. However, if San Francisco's own front office leaked the information to The Athletic's two insiders as a means to undercut Aiyuk, it's understandable why the receiver would feel slighted in a major way.
What's clear, though, is he's fully done with the 49ers. And the Niners are fully done with him, at least in terms of donning a jersey for them again.