Mark Schlereth, NFL analyst, doesn’t hold back on Brandon Aiyuk: “Why would you ever pay a wide receiver?”

Monday’s 42-38 win against the Chicago Bears gives San Francisco a shot at winning the NFC West - if they do that, they’ll earn a bye as the No.1 seeds.

Brock Purdy delivered a game-changing performance with two key touchdown passes, including one to Jauan Jennings with 2:15 left. He finished 24 for 33 for 303 yards, and three touchdowns with one interception.

San Francisco’s playoff chances

If the Niners beat Seattle (13-3) in the final game of the regular season on Saturday, they will clinch the NFC and bypass the first round of the playoffs.

All of that leaves NFL analyst Mark Schlereth wondering why San Francisco wasted so much money on handing wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk a new deal in August 2024 when he could have been traded to one of three teams (Steelers, Browns or the Patriots).

Instead, Aiyuk signed a lucrative four-year contract worth $120 million but played just seven games before suffering a season-ending injury to his right knee. He has yet to reappear and last month, the franchise voided the guaranteed money that they player would have received for 2026. Aiyuk will not be involved in the postseason either after being placed on the reserve/left squad list.

“I took a couple of things away from that game,” Schlereth explained, “One, why would you ever pay a wide receiver? We make such a big deal out of the receiver position. Brandon Aiyuk... Brandon Aiyuk is like a tree that falls in the forest - if nobody’s there to hear it, it doesn’t make a sound. Does anybody care anymore? How stupid! I don’t even know what happened. He made a big fuss. He wanted a big contract, he got his new contract, tore his ACL and then what happened? He was pissed off about what? I mean, I don’t even know! Honestly, I don’t know what he’s pissed off about.

Aiyuk missing and on the reserve/left squad list

“But this is just another reason that Kyle Shanahan has as a frontrunner for the Coach of the Year because, you have a bunch of also-rans playing wide receiver in San Francisco, and because that offense orchestrates so well through Christian McCaffrey, the way they use the running game to set up the passing game, the way they tie and marry their play action together with their run... it is incredible”.

Schlereth ended by underlining his point, “When you have a dumb coach or you have coaches that aren’t good, you probably do need to sign wide receivers to a lot of money and deal with the mercurial nature and the selfishness and just the overall turd nature of those guys. But why would you? San Francisco is just a case in point. Those guys understand offense. Kyle Shanahan understands how to call an offensive game, how to attack a defense, how to set up the passing game through the run game, use play action to find wide open guys and you’re 100 percent right about Brock Purdy. And again, why would you spend that kind of money breaking the bank for a wide receiver?”

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