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ESPN is Optimistic About 49ers WR Ricky Pearsall's Rookie Season

Pearsall's role this season is to be insurance in case the 49ers trade Brandon Aiyuk, which they probably won't. He might also step in for Samuel when he misses time due to injury, which happens every season.

Grant Cohn

May 10, 2024; Santa Clara, CA, USA; San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Ricky Pearsall (14) runs drills during the 49ers rookie minicamp at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, CA. Mandatory Credit: Robert Kupbens-USA TODAY Sports
May 10, 2024; Santa Clara, CA, USA; San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Ricky Pearsall (14) runs drills during the 49ers rookie minicamp at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, CA. Mandatory Credit: Robert Kupbens-USA TODAY Sports / Robert Kupbens-USA TODAY Sports
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It's still unclear how the 49ers intend to use rookie wide receiver Ricky Pearsall this year.

Assuming they keep both Brandon Aiyuk and Deebo Samuel through the season, Pearsall won't start. And there's a good chance he won't be the slot receiver either, because the 49ers recently gave Jauan Jennings a one-year extension worth up to $15.4 million with $10.5 million guaranteed. Not exactly chump change.

And yet, ESPN's Mike Clay expects Pearsall will outproduce Jennings in 2024 and establish himself as the 49ers' no. 3 receiver behind Aiyuk and Samuel.

Clay recently projected the 2024 stats for every player in the NFL, and he predicts Pearsall will catch 29 passes, gain 385 receiving yards and score 3 touchdowns. I find this projection to be a bit ambitious, considering Clay predicts Jennings will catch just 15 passes for 196 yards and 1 touchdown.

Pearsall's role this season is to be insurance in case the 49ers trade Brandon Aiyuk, which they probably won't. He might also step in for Samuel when he misses time due to injury, which happens every season.

But Jennings will have a bigger role in the offense than Pearsall this year. Jennings just had an excellent postseason. Brock Purdy's passer rating when targeting him in the three playoff games was 127.4. And he's the best blocker of all the wide receivers.

Meanwhile, Pearsall has to learn Kyle Shanahan's offensive system, which often takes wide receivers a full year to master.

Don't be surprised if 2024 essentially is a redshirt year for the 49ers' first-round pick.

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Grant Cohn
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.

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