What led to the 49ers’ decision to extend coach Kyle Shanahan and how players reacted
A defining characteristic for Richard Sherman is brain power. He’s become one of the best cornerbacks of his generation, in large part, because of his ability to know what receivers do before they do it.
So when Sherman was considering joining the 49ers in 2018, he knew head coach Kyle Shanahan had one of the NFL’s best minds because he had gone against him numerous times. The two had dinner in Los Gatos and shared their visions. Shanahan offered Sherman, who had recently been released from the Seattle Seahawks, his prospective on what the 49ers, coming off a 6-10 season, could develop into.
It must have worked.
Sherman signed a three-year deal with the 49ers as he waded into his 30s. It turned out to be a good decision. Sherman helped transform San Francisco’s defense from also-ran to elite, cashing in on Shanahan’s ideas that led to the 40-year-old head coach earning a six-year contract extension that became official on Monday.
“I’m very happy for him,” Sherman, who was named a Pro Bowler and second-team All-Pro last season, wrote in a text message to The Sacramento Bee. “He’s earned it and deserves it.”
The deal, which puts Shanahan under contract through 2025, makes him one of the NFL’s five highest-paid head coaches, according to ESPN. The new agreement replaces the contract he signed in 2017.
“Great news!!” right tackle Mike McGlinchey wrote in a message to The Bee. “Obviously incredibly well deserved and no one around here wants to play for anyone else.”
Receiver Deebo Samuel used his Instagram story to show the way he felt, using a goat emoji (signaling “greatest of all time”) to celebrate the contract of the coach that helped him become the second-most productive rookie receiver in team history with 802 yards (Jerry Rice had 927 in 1985). Samuel had more yards from scrimmage than Rice, 961 to 953, thanks to his involvement in the running game.
“Deserves every bit of it!!! This man works hard! Everyday!” tweeted wideout Kendrick Bourne, a key contributor who went undrafted in 2017.
The decision to extend Shanahan came from the team’s formerly embattled CEO, Jed York, who gave a contract extension to a 49ers’ coach for the first time since Steve Mariucci in 1999. The team has had six coaches since, with Jim Harbaugh being the only one to reach the playoffs since Mariucci during his final season of 2002.
Harbaugh was the only one of those six coaches to last four seasons. Shanahan’s new deal sets him up to be with San Francisco for nine.
Shanahan’s new contract is not surprising. York in January, right before departing for Super Bowl LIV in Miami, talked at length about what was working so well for Shanahan’s regime three years in after inheriting a 2-14 club.
In particular, it was the partnership Shanahan created by choosing John Lynch to be his general manager after Lynch pitched Shanahan on the idea during the hiring process in the winter of 2017.
It was a less-than-subtle signal from York that Harbaugh didn’t have the same level of collaboration with the front office. His relationships with York and then-general manager Trent Baalke blew up and bled onto the field during the 8-8 season in 2014, the year Levi’s Stadium opened.
Part of the fit for Shanahan had to do with his father, Mike, who served as offensive coordinator the last time the 49ers won the Super Bowl in the 1994 season and later led the Denver Broncos to two championships.
“I think it became very, very clear within the first 10 minutes (of the coaching interview) that we saw how to build an organization in a very similar way because his father was here,” York said in January. “He saw the culture that Bill (Walsh) instilled in the late ’70s through the ’80s and early ’90s. And even when Bill wasn’t here, his spirit and the 49er way was still apart of it and Mike took that.
“So, for Kyle, the Mike Shanahan way really a part of the Bill Walsh 49ers way was part of what I wanted and I think that’s where we really hit it off.”
Shanahan has matched his coaching mind with relatability. He listens to Lil Wayne, wears Yeezy sneakers (a highlight for receiver Emmanuel Sanders after being traded for last October) and lets players help make playlists for the locker room and practice field. The team even plays music on a giant boombox in the tunnel before player introductions. That’s not something a no-nonsense coach like the New England Patriots’ Bill Belichick would endorse.
But what about Lynch and why didn’t he get a new contract, too?
Lynch and Shanahan signed matching six-year deals when they were hired. It was a clear sign of the partnership and collaboration York was trying to foster early with his new regime. Why Lynch didn’t get a new contract became a key question as soon the news about Shanahan’s deal broke Monday afternoon.
It’s my understanding nothing has changed with the dynamic between Shanahan and Lynch now that the coach received a new contract. The 49ers might have preferred to get matching extensions done, but that wasn’t the case.
For now, Lynch is under contract for three more seasons, making a competitive salary with other quality NFL general managers. It sounds like the 49ers want to keep him around longer than his exiting contract so his fruitful partnership with Shanahan can continue. There’s no time frame on when that could happen.
In the meantime, the York and the organization will hope Shanahan will continue proving what he conveyed to Sherman that night at dinner in 2018: the 49ers will be contenders for years to come.
This story was originally published June 16, 2020 at 2:34 PM.
