The 6 biggest reasons the 49ers shouldn’t end the Kyle Shanahan era

Forget the I’m-so-mad-you’ve-gotta-fire-the-coach-immediately overreactions that surround every NFL team — especially the 49ers. That irrationality is simply the cost of doing billions of dollars worth of business in the loud new-media world.

Kyle Shanahan can take it. He makes the big bucks, so he gets the credit when the 49ers do well and massive heat when they’re struggling — as, of course, they have through the entire 2024 season. Flame on.

But sane hiring and firing decisions can’t be made in an emotional hothouse; Jed York has done the impulsive thing a time or two before. He has learned a great deal from those errors over the years. And under a calmer, more practical analysis, there is just one outcome over the next few weeks that could lead to the 49ers and Shanahan breaking up at the end of this dismal season.

If the players demonstrably lose all faith and purpose and get crushed over the last five games, that’d be a sign that important things are dissipating, and maybe it’s time for something new.

But I don’t expect anything like that to be displayed Sunday at Levi’s Stadium against the Chicago Bears — or at any of the 49ers’ remaining games this season. Not even with Christian McCaffrey and Jordan Mason both getting placed on injured reserve after sustaining injuries in Sunday’s loss to the Bills. Not even if the 49ers judiciously extend the time off for both Nick Bosa and Trent Williams, who have missed the last two games. Not even if the 49ers start to give more playing time to younger, unproved backups and wind down the seasons for Deebo Samuel, George Kittle, Charvarius Ward, and others.

I still expect the 5-7 49ers to play hard under Shanahan and, to some extent, to play hard for him. It didn’t always look that way Sunday during their 35-10 loss in Buffalo, but that was during a snowstorm at the end of back-to-back long road trips and after the 49ers watched McCaffrey hobble off the field with a season-ending injury. That game was going to look funky whether the 49ers were 9-2 or 5-6 going into it.

I expect that whatever’s left of this roster will fight for the continuation of this era and work to elevate themselves in 2025. Of course, with so many missing stars, the 49ers might not win the majority of the next five games. They might get overcome at times by more talented units. But I don’t think Shanahan and John Lynch have assembled a group — even a patched-together group — of quitters.

In more subtle ways than we’re used to, the 49ers and Shanahan will continue to show why he should and will remain the coach and No. 1 shot-caller into the 2025 season. Here are six specific and practical reasons.

Can’t get any more practical than this, right? There are examples of a first-year coach coming in and pushing an underperforming team to great heights, but not many, aside from Jim Harbaugh, who isn’t available this time around. You’d have to find the perfect candidate at the perfect time. What are the odds of that happening on a team whose pre-Shanahan hires included Chip Kelly, Jim Tomsula, Dennis Erickson, Mike Singletary, and Mike Nolan?

The 49ers have an expensive roster loaded with premium players, all acquired to fit on a Shanahan team and all dying to win a Super Bowl ASAP. If the 49ers put stars like McCaffrey, Bosa, and Fred Warner into new schemes, they could be lesser performers. And if the 49ers realize that and start redoing the roster, there’s no guarantee that they’ll ever be as talented as they are now.

Then there is the Brock Purdy situation, which deserves its own paragraph. It’s improbable that a new coach would match as perfectly with Purdy as Shanahan has. But Purdy is due for a new deal next offseason worth something close to $55 million a year, with a massive guarantee. Would York want to commit to this if he’s not sure about the QB/coach relationship? Maybe not. Which would start the clock ticking on Purdy’s time with the 49ers and probably lead to a search for a new QB. And those searches are always fun — wait, I mean: perilous, costly, and season-consuming.

It took a certain competitive arrogance for Shanahan (and Lynch) to accept this job in the first place — to inherit one of the worst and most mismanaged rosters in the league and never doubt that a long-term turnaround was inevitable. Wallflowers don’t win many NFL games. Wishy-washy coaches have no chance.

Sure, Shanahan can be stubborn, prideful, and occasionally mystifying. But players don’t follow feckless leaders. If you want a guy who commands the respect of 53 large and competitive men, you pick the guy who makes decisions without waiting to see which way the fans want him to go, who doesn’t stop to apologize for mistakes because he’s too busy concentrating on the next game.

What great coach proved anything by blaming himself in public for errors? Vince Lombardi? Yeah, right. Bill Walsh? Nope. Could you imagine Bill Belichick telling fans how many strategic mistakes he just made and asking for forgiveness? Lol x 100. You want the coach who can battle his way from a bad year back to the top the next one. No apologies, more victories.

For example, the 49ers went 6-10 in 2020, a haunted Super Bowl hangover season just like this one. Then they started 3-5 in 2021 as the drumbeat sounded about a potential end of this regime. Shanahan admitted then that he just couldn’t get into rhythm as a play caller but added that he was sure he would. What happened after that? Shanahan found a rhythm, and the 49ers burst into the postseason and got to the NFC Championship Game. The next season, they got to the conference title game again. The season after that, they got to the Super Bowl and held a 3-point lead in overtime.

Can Shanahan lead another 49ers bounce-back in 2025? I’d bet on him doing it before I’d bet on all the somebodies who’ve never done it.

Yes, I know that there are constant complaints that Shanahan has lost two Super Bowls with the 49ers. You know who doesn’t blow Super Bowls? The guys who never get there. The guys who never have leads in Super Bowls. The guys who couldn’t get a team to the Big Game if you gave them 100 years.

The 49ers are sitting in the 14th slot in the 2025 draft order, with a shot at getting into the top 12 (especially if they lose Sunday to the 4-8 Bears). That might be a nice chance to pick up that prime right tackle they could use. Or a plug-and-play pass rusher. Or a star receiver who can actually get open against man-to-man coverage.

There’s more: Presuming they don’t win out and take the NFC West, the 49ers are going to avoid a first-place schedule next season. Their first-place schedule this season set them up against the Chiefs, while the Rams and their second-place schedule got the Raiders. If the 49ers finish fourth in the NFC West this season, in 2025 they’d be lined up against the Bears (currently in fourth place in the NFC North), Giants (NFC East), and Browns (AFC North). The first-place NFC West finisher, in contrast, would at the moment be set to play the Lions, Eagles, and Steelers in this rotation. Sliiiight difference.

Remind you of any previous Shanahan season? It should. After the 49ers finished third in 2021, they gobbled up their third-place schedule in 2022 on their way to a 10-game winning streak to close the regular season, a 13-4 record, and the NFC’s No. 2 seed.

Lynch and Shanahan came into this together, and there’s been no visible evidence of a split developing. They remain friends, and they continue to rely on each other. I think Lynch, who has plenty of other career options, would exit the franchise if York soured on Shanahan.

So then York would have to go on a GM search, too.

The 49ers announced a “multi-year” extension for both Shanahan and Lynch in September 2023, which probably pushed Shanahan’s deal to 2027 (or beyond) and upped his salary to around $15 million a year. That’d be a lot of cash for York to eat now, next year, or even two years from now.

The new deal almost certainly has offsets that would cut down York’s outlay if Shanahan gets another job in football (and maybe even broadcasting), but York would probably still be on the hook for big money if he fires Shanahan in January. And in that scenario, Shanahan would have his choice of head-coaching jobs. For instance, even with offsets, York could be paying a fired Shanahan upward of $8 million a year to coach for somebody else — possibly against the 49ers — while also paying for a new 49ers coach. I find it difficult to believe that York would enjoy contemplating any of that.

Only four active coaches have more career playoff wins than Shanahan: Andy Reid (26), John Harbaugh (12), Mike McCarthy (11), and Sean Payton (9). And Shanahan’s .667 playoff winning percentage is better than all of them.

I mean, come on, what are we talking about here?