49ers' Kyle Shanahan Explains Draft Strategy After Trading Down in First Round

The San Francisco 49ers executed two trades to move out of the first round of the 2024 NFL Draft last Thursday. Their first selection came at No. 33 overall, where they selected wide receiver De'Zhaun Stribling.

Head coach Kyle Shanahan addressed the draft strategy on The Rich Eisen Show on Thursday, emphasizing that the team accomplished its primary objectives. The 49ers expanded their draft class from six to eight picks while still securing the player they intended to select in the first round.

"That's kind of what we were hoping for," Shanahan told Eisen, via David Bonilla of 49erswebzone.com. "Our first goal was that the guy we wanted would fall to 27, but we got our second goal, and that was to trade back twice, accumulate some more picks, and still get the guy."

Shanahan added:

"We would have taken Stribling at 30, if we had to pick, but to get to 33 and still get the guy we wanted [was ideal]. . . . I think we added eight players who all have a very good chance of making our team, and on top of that, we added a sixth-round pick for next year, which I think's huge because we didn't have one."

The 49ers viewed the second round through the end of the third as the strongest section of the draft. However, the team entered the draft with only one pick in that range after trading their third-round selection for defensive tackle Osa Odighizuwa.

"I was really concerned going into it, because I also felt we needed to add more than six players — not necessarily for this year, but also for next year," Shanahan said. "All the stuff's tied together on how many free agents you lose and things like that. So I was worried that if we were going to go get players that we were targeting, we were going to end up using some of our fourth-round picks to come up."