ENGLEWOOD, Colo — What’s amazing about this dominant San Francisco 49ers’ run is no one is talking about their catastrophic Trey Lance trade.
Check that. It was a horrific trade, not catastrophic. It should have crippled the 49ers every bit as much as the Russell Wilson trade has seemingly handicapped the Denver Broncos.
The Broncos “only” traded away two, first-round selections for Wilson. The 49ers dealt three first-round picks for the right to move up from No. 12 to No. 3 overall in the 2021 draft to select Lance, a high-risk, high-ceiling, unproven prospect from North Dakota State. Wilson, a proven Super Bowl-caliber commodity when he was acquired, at least gave the Broncos two years of mixed results. Lance essentially gave the 49ers nothing.
Yet in the three years since their ill-advised Lance decision, the 49ers have reached three consecutive NFC Championship Games, coming from behind Sunday to beat the Lions and advance to their second Super Bowl in five years.
In the two years since the Broncos’ ill-advised Wilson decision, they have gone 5-12 and 8-9.
The reason why 49ers’ head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch overcame their Lance mistake was, first, they had already built an otherwise talented roster from top to bottom. And secondly, the struck gold with the No. 262 and final overall pick in the 2022 NFL Draft by selecting Iowa State quarterback Brock Purdy.
Don’t let the remarkable Purdy find underestimate the 49ers’ overall talent. There is no Nick Bosa, Trent Williams, Deebo Samuel, George Kittle, Fred Warner, Christian McCaffrey, or even Brandon Aiyuk or Kyle Juszczyk on the Broncos’ roster.
The Broncos can overcome the Wilson trade. But it’s not just about hitting their No. 12 pick in the first round of the 2024 draft, although it starts there. Every team can get a good player at No. 12. And it’s not just about finding the right quarterback, although becomes necessary, too.
The trick is to start drafting players like Kittle, as the 49ers did in 2017 with the second pick of the fifth round, and not Jake Butt with the first pick in the fifth round of that same draft, as did the Broncos. Apologies to Jake. Injuries weren’t his fault. But his injury history was there when the Broncos took him.
And even if the Broncos didn’t have a first-round pick in the 2022 draft because of the Wilson deal, they took cornerback Faion Hicks 30 spots ahead of Purdy in the seventh round. By the time Purdy became Mr. Irrelevant, his team was so stacked, he was able to become the NFL’s passing leader, by a wide margin, with a 113.0 rating in his second season.
The Broncos are more than a quarterback away from duplicating the 49ers’ feat of reaching the conference championship three years in a row.
Sean Payton and George Paton are capable of rebuilding the Broncos. Perhaps, "rebuild," agonizing as it may be, is the proper method. Either way, Payton and Paton need to hit on not only No. 12, but find a hidden star or two in the second wave of free agency and with their picks in the fourth, fifth (two) and sixth rounds.
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