All 49ers

The Worst Addition of the Offseason for the 49ers

Before I reveal his name, let me preface by writing that he may very well have been the best player available for the price at his position.

Grant Cohn

The Worst Addition of the Offseason for the 49ers
The Worst Addition of the Offseason for the 49ers /
In this story:

The 49ers overpaid for zero players this offseason, which is good. They were prudent and fiscally responsible. Still, some of their signings were better than others.

This is about the worst signing of the offseason for the 49ers.

Before I reveal his name, let me preface by writing that he may very well have been the best player available for the price at his position. You can't always find cheap upgrades in free agency. But he's a major downgrade in the starting lineup for the 49ers.

I'm talking about linebacker De'Vondre Campbell.

To be fair, he wasn't the 49ers' first choice. They had an agreement with Eric Kendircks on a one-year deal, but he backed out of it at the last minute to sign a two-year deal with the Cowboys. Kendricks is a good player and would have been an excellent signing, but he got a better offer from Dallas.

And the only reason the 49ers are in the market for a linebacker is because Dre Greenlaw tore his Achilles in the Super Bowl and it's unclear how much of the upcoming season he will miss. So the 49ers need a linebacker who can start for some or all of it.

Enter Campbell. He'll be 31 in July and he was an All Pro in 2021, but the past two seasons he was a frequently-injured liability for the Packers defense. Now he instantly becomes the weakest link on the 49ers defense.

The 49ers need to draft a linebacker who can start. Campbell can't be their only addition at this position.

Published
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.

Home/News