One of the weaknesses on the 49ers’ roster is their depth at tight end. While George Kittle is the league’s best player at the position, the roster behind him leaves something to be desired. While their returning their backup tight end, and drafted one in the sixth round, they don’t appear to have a legitimate pass-catching threat to pair with Kittle. That answer may have come Friday when ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that Browns fourth-year tight end David Njoku requested a trade.
Njoku was a first-round pick out of the University of Miami in the 2017 draft. Despite just one year of big-time pass-catching production in college, his athleticism on tape jumped off the screen and his combine workouts corroborated what the tape showed. He was in the 80th percentile or better in the 40-yard dash, broad jump, vertical jump and 3-cone drill. Njoku displayed that athleticism inside a 6-4, 253-pound frame.
His athleticism alone puts him above the players San Francisco has behind Kittle. Ross Dwelley, a former undrafted free agent, is a versatile blocker, but doesn’t offer a lot as a receiver. He’s averaged just 6.2 yards per reception in his first two seasons. Sixth-round pick Charlie Woerner caught only 34 passes in four years at Georgia. Undrafted second-year player Daniel Helm hasn’t played an NFL snap yet. Njoku offers an explosive athletic element that the 49ers’ tight end group currently lacks.
He’s yet to translate that athletic talent into success in the NFL, however. He caught 88 balls for 1,025 yards and eight touchdowns his first two years, and graded out as an average run blocker through his first two seasons per Pro Football Focus. His third season was limited to just four games by a broken wrist.
Njoku is a good enough athlete to fill a variety of roles in an offense as creative as Kyle Shanahan’s. While there’d be some blocking responsibilities, and he’d need to improve some in that area, there would be an added wrinkle for defenses to worry about when San Francisco is in multiple tight-end sets.
They deployed personnel groupings with multiple tight ends on 32.1 percent of their snaps last season according to Sharp Football Stats. Their passing success from those groupings was mixed — although quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo had one touchdown and three interceptions out of 12 personnel (one running back, two tight ends) — their most frequently used multiple tight end package.
Adding a pass catcher like Njoku makes the 49ers more difficult to defend, and he has the athleticism to take advantage of the space generated by Shanahan’s scheme in a way none of their current reserves can.
Price is a significant issue for San Francisco in any move they’re going to execute over the next couple offseasons. Njoku is still on his rookie deal and has two seasons left, including his fifth-year option. He carries a manageable $3,030,791 cap hit in 2020 per Over the Cap, and $6,013,000 next season, although it wouldn’t be expensive to cut ties with him should his career not take off in the Bay Area.
Compensation is another factor at play. The 49ers are probably out of the running if there’s a robust market for Njoku. For a variety of reasons they’ll need a healthy stock of draft picks in next year’s draft and they already unloaded a third-round choice in the trade to acquire left tackle Trent Williams. If Njoku is available for a fifth or sixth-round choice, the move becomes more feasible.
San Francisco made clear their desire to add another pass-catching threat at tight end when they pursued Austin Hooper in free agency. He was the best available player on the market and wound up signing with Cleveland as the highest-paid tight end in the league. Their limited number of draft picks forced them to wait until Round 6 to select a tight end in the draft, and even then Woerner was mostly a blocking specialist in college.
Even if the 49ers don’t ink Njoku to a long-term extension, the short-term gain would elevate their offense to a level it can’t reach with their current group of tight ends. If Njoku can be had for a late-round pick, San Francisco should make a call and add a cost-controlled player that can immediately make their offense more dangerous.
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