49ers tight end George Kittle knows about negotiating with the 49ers front office. Just two offseasons ago he was eligible for an extension and earned one that made him the highest-paid tight end in league history. Now his teammate Deebo Samuel is working through the ebbs and flows of a contract negotiation, but threw a wrench into the mix when he requested a trade a week before the draft.
There are reported factors at play beyond money for Samuel which complicate his long-term extension, but Kittle is still optimistic the All-Pro wide receiver will suit up in red and gold next year.
In an episode of Bussin With the Boys, a podcast with Titans offensive lineman Taylor Lewan and linebacker Will Compton, Kittle talked about the Samuel extension. He made it clear he has no inside knowledge on the negotiations and hasn’t talked to Kyle Shanahan, John Lynch or Samuel.
“What’s gonna happen, and this is me not knowing anything, Deebo’s got another year on his contract left regardless, right? Assuming he’s not gonna sit out, that’s a lot of money,” Kittle said. “So he’s either gonna play this year as a Niner with one year left on his deal, or he’s gonna get a contract extension. At this point you can’t even trade him. What’re you gonna trade him for, a first-round pick in next year’s draft? That doesn’t help us this year. Like, come on, you can’t trade for future picks. Not right now. So that window’s kind of closed.”
The ability to trade Samuel mostly went out the window after the Jets used the No. 10 overall pick in this year’s draft instead of including it in a deal for the 49ers receiver. San Francisco didn’t want to trade their Swiss Army knife and per reports were never tantalized with a compelling offer. They were going to require a king’s ransom and no team was willing to come to the table to get a deal done.
If that was the case in April, it’s hard to imagine a team unloading adequate assets that would help the 49ers this year. The team is also unlikely to be interested in future selections, as Kittle laid out. They’re too close to winning a Super Bowl to look beyond their 2022 roster.
Samuel surely wants to get paid, and his attendance at mandatory minicamp was an indicator things are at least moving in the right direction. If he was unwilling to take the relatively minor fine for missing minicamp, it’s nigh impossible to envision him skipping game checks and then putting himself in a position where he’s not an unrestricted free agent next season.
Kittle’s logic tracks, and he pointed to the middle of July as a potential endpoint where Samuel gets his contract done, but he was also careful to say nothing is set in stone.
“And something crazy could happen,” Kittle said. “I could be eating my words in two weeks, but the Niners have done every major contract – mine, Fred Warners’ – the week before the season started. So, my guess is within three weeks we’ll hear news of it. But I have no idea.”
That time just ahead of training camp is when San Francisco has traditionally done deals in this regime. Defensive end Nick Bosa has also been slow to get contract talks underway. There’s no need for panic though since training camp and the preseason are real barometers for whether a player will sit out games.
Kittle could certainly be wrong, but given the logic and what we know about Samuel and the 49ers, we’d bet he’s probably correct.
