The San Francisco 49ers were one of a bunch of teams reportedly interested in trading for superstar edge rusher Khalil Mack prior to him getting dealt to the Chicago Bears.
49ers general manager John Lynch confirmed Saturday that they were indeed hoping to land Mack but had a limit to just how much they were willing to pay for the defensive stud.
“The answer is yes, we’d have been foolish not to,” Lynch said per Cam Inman of The Mercury News. “The guy’s a spectacular player, and we’ve always said we’re going to exhaust every option to improve our team, so we did. We went in aggressively but also knowing that we had to set some parameters, and we did. Somebody else landed him, and we’re excited about our team.”
The 49ers — or any other team for that matter — would’ve been hard-pressed to top the Bears’ winning bid of two first-round picks (2019 and 2020) along with a sixth-round pick in 2019 and a third-round pick in 2020 in exchange for Mack, a second-round pick in the 2020 NFL Draft and a 2020 conditional fifth-round pick.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the 49ers went hard after a pass rusher of Mack’s elite caliber. San Francisco was tied for 26th in the league in sacks last season with just 30. They decided to part ways with their sacks leader in Elvis Dumervil (6.5 sacks), who recently announced his retirement. Mack certainly would’ve helped lift that pass rush in a big way.
After their failed bid to land Mack, the Niners will now have to rely on the likes of Solomon Thomas, Arik Armstead, DeForest Buckner, Cassius Marsh, Dekoda Watson, Ronald Blair and Jullian Taylor to provide a more effective pass rush this season.
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