Accounting error will cost a 2025 fifth-round pick
The San Francisco 49ers will pay a price for a payroll mistake.
The NFL announced Monday that the 49ers will forfeit their 2025 fifthround pick and have their 2024 fourth-round pick, No. 131 overall, moved back four spots, because of “administrative payroll accounting errors” that misrepresented how much salary-cap space they had before the start of free agency last year.
The league determined that the 49ers remained under the cap, despite the mistake, and there was no attempt to circumvent the cap.
The 49ers issued a statement: “We take responsibility and accept the imposed discipline from the NFL due to a clerical payroll error. At no time did we mislead or otherwise deceive the League or gain a competitive advantage in connection with the payroll mistake.”
The 49ers now have six picks in the 2025 draft, one in each round except the fifth.
The loss of a fifth-round selection is notable because of the success the 49ers have had in that round since head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch were hired in 2017. The 49es have snagged five starters in the fifth: tight end George Kittle (2017), linebacker Dre Greenlaw (2019), right tackle Colton McKivitz (2020), safety Talanoa Hufanga (2021) and cornerback Deommodore Lenoir. In 2018, they drafted Jets cornerback D.J. Reed, who signed a three-year, $33 million contract with New York in 2022.
“We joke around,” Lynch said in 2020, “we’ll trade anything, just not our fifth rounders. Those have been good to us.”
Tackle added: The 49ers signed offensive tackle Brandon Parker, 28, to a one-year contract. Parker, a 2018 third-round pick, spent his first five seasons with Raiders and started 33 games.
However, Parker played in just five games (one start) the past two seasons because of injuries, including a torn pectoral he suffered in a preseason game in 2022 that forced him to miss the season. Parker figures to compete with Jaylon Moore and a potential draft pick to serve as the top backup behind projected starters Trent Williams and McKivitz.