There’s a new wrinkle in the Brandon Aiyuk saga.
According to Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk there were as many as five teams before the draft that would have been willing to pay Aiyuk up to $28 million per year had the 49ers been willing to trade him.
It’s not a surprise that San Francisco explored the trade market for the receiver. It’s also not a surprise that Aiyuk’s representatives went looking for what the All-Pro wide receiver was worth to teams in search of help at the position. However, that so many teams were willing to pony up on a deal for him helps explain why Aiyuk is so dug in on whatever his present demand is.
If Aiyuk wanted $28 million before the draft, there’s a chance that number has ticked up as the market has settled. If the 49ers are still below that mark, it stands to reason that the WR isn’t willing to come down since the market has dictated to him that his demand should actually be higher.
On the other hand, none of this provides any further incentive for the 49ers to trade Aiyuk. Before the draft there wasn’t an offer they were willing to take for him. It certainly doesn’t seem likely a team would now be willing to bring offer even more, which is what it would take to pry him away from San Francisco at this stage of the calendar.
The underlying truth of all this is still here and perhaps even more clear after this report: the 49ers don’t want to trade Brandon Aiyuk.
A contract extension is going to require some form of compromise between the two sides. Given what we know about the market, the 49ers should be willing to come up toward that $28 million per year number. They could even get it to look like $30 million per with the way they structure the deal. Signs point to that eventually happening though since there’s incentive for both the 49ers and Aiyuk to get a deal done at this point. It’s just a matter of getting through the sticky parts of the negotiation to reach a number both sides are comfortable with.
