The San Francisco 49ers enter 2024 with high aspirations of competing for a championship. A team like that can always use more defensive talent.
The 49ers have standout performers at every level of the defense, from Nick Bosa, to Fred Warner, to Dre Greenlaw, to Talanoa Hufanga. All in all, the San Francisco defense ranked eighth in 2023 in yardage allowed, and third in scoring defense.
It's hard to look at the defensive roster in San Francisco and poke any obvious holes. But in training camp, defensive ends Leonard Floyd and Yetur Gross Matos have both suffered knee sprains, leaving their ability to start the season
One insider believes the insurance for Floyd and Gross-Matos is available via trade, perhaps even before the regular season gets underway. And that player plays for the New York Giants.
Art Stapleton, who covers the Giants for USA Today, proposed on X that the Giants could send the 49ers outside linebacker/defensive end Azeez Ojulari for one of cornerbacks Rock Ya-Sin or Darryl Luter, inside linebacker Tatum Bethune, or inside linebacker Curtis Robinson.
"I could see Joe Schoen making a call to John Lynch," Stapleton said, before listing the names seen above.
Ojulari, 24, is entering his fourth season in the National Football League after the Giants picked him in the second round of the 2021 draft. He hasn't consistently been healthy in the early stage of his career, but he's been quite productive when able to suit up for New York.
In 35 career games, split between outside linebacker and defensive end, Ojulari has 47 solo tackles, 16.0 sacks, 14 tackles for loss, 27 quarterback hits, and four forced fumbles. He's someone opposing offenses have to game plan for whenever he steps on the field.
Though the four players Stapleton proposed the 49ers could send back to the Giants are all talented, cornerback and inside linebacker are all positions of depth for San Francisco, leaving those players slightly more expendable.
But is it worth losing depth to make a play for a talented player like Ojulari, who becomes an unrestricted free agent after 2025? That is the question Lynch and the front office would have to ask themselves.
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