49ers Re-Sign Mohamed Sanu

Sanu played three games with the 49ers last season, caught one pass and gained nine yards. Then they cut him.

Grant Cohn | Mar 27, 2021

The 49ers need wide receivers.

They lost their starting slot receiver, Kendrick Bourne, because he signed with the Patriots. And they didn't re-sign their backup slot receiver, Trent Taylor, because he's awful.

So they re-signed veteran wide receiver Mohamed Sanu to a one-year deal, according to Mike McCartney. Sanu played three games with the 49ers last season, caught one pass and gained nine yards. Then they cut him.

But that was back when the 49ers still had Bourne, Taylor and Dante Pettis -- three young receivers the 49ers were invested in. Now they're gone, and the 49ers are thin at that position.

Their current options in the slot are Jalen Hurd, who has missed his first two seasons in the NFL due to injury, Ja'Jaun Jennings, who spent last season on the practice squad, Richie James Jr., who never gets consistent playing time, and River Cracraft, who has a great name.

Sanu actually might be the best slot receiver currently on the 49ers roster. He played seven games with the Lions last season after the 49ers cut him and performed well. Got targeted 23 times and caught 16 passes. He's a reliable possession receiver who has huge hands and will be just 32-years old next season.

The 49ers probably don't envision Sanu being their starting slot receiver next season -- they most likely will draft someone to fill that role. But there's no guarantee a rookie will be better than Sanu right away.

He'll get his chance to prove himself in training camp.

Published Mar 27, 2021

GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.