49ers General Manager John Lynch spent the last few years building the roster that took the team to Super Bowl LIV, but he’s shifting into a new mode for the 2020 offseason.
Lynch likened the earlier offseasons to going to the grocery store and taking anything you wanted from the shelf. He describes this year’s mindset as “I’ll have that, but I might have to put that back” in order to balance out holding onto key players while also finding ways to improve the team.
He’ll also have to do it with limited cap space, although Lynch downplayed that restriction.
“Someone was asking me, ‘Characterize our situation,’” Lynch said, via ESPN.com. “It’s not bleak. It’s not like some people where you have to cut players just to be able to meet certain deals. I think more so understanding that there are players that are really good players we want to take care of, knowing it is tight. There may have to be trade-offs along the way. But I think we’re in a good position to find a way to certainly keep the core together and even, like I said, our mindset to improve it.”
Extensions for some veteran players and jettisoning others can create more cap space, but that may not stop the trade-offs for the 49ers this offseason from including farewells to players like Arik Armstead, Emmanuel Sanders and Jimmie Ward.