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PFF: The 49ers Have the NFL's 9th-Worst Offensive Line

What a brutal assessment.

Grant Cohn

Dec 17, 2023; Glendale, Arizona, USA; San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy (13) with center Jake Brendel (64) and guard Jon Feliciano (55) against the Arizona Cardinals at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
Dec 17, 2023; Glendale, Arizona, USA; San Francisco 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy (13) with center Jake Brendel (64) and guard Jon Feliciano (55) against the Arizona Cardinals at State Farm Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports / Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
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The biggest and potentially only weakness on the 49ers' roster is their offensive line.

Every other position group is stacked when healthy. The 49ers simply don't like to invest much in offensive linemen other than Trent Williams who's a difference-maker. Their philosophy is to invest in offensive players who touch the ball, not ones who merely block.

And because of this philosophy, the 49ers have the ninth-worst offensive line in the NFL according to Pro Football Focus.

"While the 49ers' offensive line features a future Hall of Famer and arguably the best offensive lineman of the past few years in Trent Williams, those around him have so far failed to impress," writes PFF analyst Zoltan Buday. "The rest of the offensive line consists of either career journeymen, such as center Jake Brendel and right guard Jon Feliciano, or young offensive linemen who the 49ers hope can improve in 2024, such as Aaron Banks and Colton McKivitz."

What a brutal assessment. And McKivitz isn't even young -- he will turn 28 in August. He's smack-dab in the middle of his prime and he's still a liability. I seriously doubt the 49ers actually expect him to improve. And Banks most likely is entering his final season on the team considering he'll be a free agent next year and the 49ers don't spend on guards.

Without Williams, who misses at least a couple games every season, the 49ers might have the worst offensive line in the NFL. You'd think they'd want to improve it so they could keep Brock Purdy upright and healthy for as long as possible. But head coach Kyle Shanahan never changes his offensive philosophy.

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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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