The Draw Play

I don’t know what is going on with 49ers hostage Brandon Aiyuk. I’m not sure anyone fully knows.

Aiyuk positioned himself to be the next big #1 wideout for the Kyle Shanahan experience. He held out, almost got traded, but eventually got paid. All pretty ordinary. He turned up to 2024 camp out of shape. He then tore his knee to shreds early in the season. That’s when things got…weird.

He vanishes from the team. He’s off doing god knows what to the point where the 49ers are able to simply void most of his contract because he won’t show up. He films himself speeding past the stadium. He vagueposts on Instagram. He seems like he’s either being given very bad advice from his life friends, he’s mentally ill, he’s just plain stupid, or he has some grievance with the 49ers staff. Most likely a combination of all 4. Whatever Aiyuk says, he feels like an unreliable narrator. It’s not hard to feel the synergy with disgraced star Antonio Brown.

Unlike Brown though, he doesn’t have the “brain injury” excuse. I don’t like that excuse and think people assign far too much blame for what happened with Brown to that Burfict hit. I think it’s probably a combination of mental illness and surrounding himself with the wrong people, giving him bad advice. Aiyuk seems desperate to join the Commanders, acting as if he has the leverage to force the 49ers to send him there. I’m not sure the Commanders even want him. Who would want someone who has caused this much drama after getting what he supposedly wanted once? The 49ers caved to his demands and paid for it. They are lucky as hell he’s a dumbass who then put himself into position to have his contact voided.

The 49ers at this stage seem to be content holding him hostage. They won’t trade him. They won’t release him. They already got out of having to pay him. They probably should trade him for whatever peanut they can scrounge up, but they are waiting for him to make it work. It costs them nothing to hold him for now, and will even start fining him should he skip camp in July. Aiyuk seems unable to realize the lack of leverage he has in this situation. He’s made himself undesirable to everyone, and he won’t take the easy steps to get reinstated so he can be released.

My guess is that eventually, he does get cut and ends up a Commander early season. How long that takes is up to him, and I have no idea what to suspect at this stage. This is all just very weird.