The 49ers have a handful of options to retain restricted free agent wide receiver Jauan Jennings. General manager John Lynch on Tuesday at the NFL combine indicated San Francisco will explore all of those options to ensure the former seventh-round WR stays in San Francisco.
Lynch told reporters the club wants to sign Jennings to a long-term deal, but that they’re open to all options in regards to keeping him around beyond this offseason. That means they’d turn to one of the handful of restricted free agent tenders if they can’t hammer out a long-term deal.
The bigger deal here is that the team would want to commit to Jennings long-term instead of potentially losing him and using just a one-year RFA tender. While he’s not the 49ers’ primary option, he’s exceptionally valuable as a third receiver where he can function as a chain-mover, red-zone threat, and as a blocker in the run game.
Finding receivers as consistently good at the little things like Jennings is isn’t particularly easy, and if the 49ers can ink him to a long-term deal before letting him test the free agent waters it would be a nice early offseason boost to their receiving corps.