Brandon Aiyuk’s once cryptic posts on Instagram are more and more obvious—and less cryptic—by the day.
The soon-to-be-former San Francisco 49ers wide receiver has continued his campaign, or at this point, plea, to get the 49ers to release him. Before we get to our main event, we’ll highlight some of the other things brought up this week. Please note that keeping up with the timeline of Aiyuk’s Instagram posts is a job all of its own, but I think I found most of the notable ones. First is another video
posted about him joining the Washington Commanders and his “mood”:
Shortly thereafter, he posted a video of himself running. Because after getting both of your knee tendons blasted, showing a video of you running inspires confidence in your audience:
Aiyuk also listed his issue was with the 49ers via an Instagram post saying the following:
- I haven’t received a single cent from them in 17 months
- Folks tryna hold me capitve lol
- Then my guarantees was voided in July of 2025
- This s**t modern day [chain emoji]
If you’re curious on that 17-month window, 17 months into the past puts us to February 2025, right where the 2024 NFL season wraps up. So if this is true, Aiyuk didn’t get any cash after February. Most of the issues surrounding his guaranteed money (or at least the reports of such) and voids that came with it, hit midway through the 2025 NFL season so that’s a lid on it if there ever was one. The 49ers went after Aiyuk’s guarantees in the 2025 offseason so this still checks out. Again, February.
And now we have the main event. Another Instagram post where Aiyuk informs us of a few things:
In that final video, he says, “No, I didn’t miss rehab; I just didn’t rehab with y’all.”
After seeing a video of him running and then a follow-up with that explanation, I paused and asked myself: “Since when was this about him missing rehab? In the thousands of words speculated, analyzed, edited, etc. about this mess, when was missing rehab ever the reason his guaranteed money was voided?
This had nothing to do with whether or not Aiyuk was rehabbing even for five minutes. It has everything to do with him not rehabbing at the 49ers’ facility and ghosting them—which Aiyuk states. So basically, Aiyuk confirms what has been reported on the 49ers’ side of things.
Outside of the Aiyuk/49ers brouhaha, there’s all the NFL executives—both current and former—growing in number at the corner opposite Aiyuk. You can add former 49ers general manager Scot McCloughan to that ever-growing list:
“When they drafted him, I said he is a number 1 receiver talent wise, but you be very very careful with the character. At Arizona State he got in trouble there too. Herm Edwards was the coach and he said ‘Listen, he’s a wildcard. We don’t know if he’s going to show up. We don’t know if he’s gonna do anything or he might come and have the best day of his career’
What he’s done to the 49ers is embarrassing. Embarrassing. What you’re getting in your building is going to be the same thing. There will be good days, but there’s gonna be bad days.”
“I think it’s obvious Brandon Aiyuk has not gotten a lot of good advice, NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero said on the Rich Eisen Show. “At least, advice he has taken.”
Pelissero pointed out that while Aiyuk says he “fired his agent”, the NFL Players Association still has Aiyuk listed with Ryan Williams as his representative. Pelissero also mentioned the catch-22 of Aiyuk not showing up to the 49ers’ facility unless released and how it has to be hte other way around.
“The 49ers don’t need to have to do anything,” Pelissero said. “I guarantee Kyle Shanahan, wherever he is—He’s probably in Cabo or Hawaii or somewhere else—he’s not sitting there looking at the Instagram and going, ”boy, the 17th insult is the one that pushed us over the top, we should just give him his way and release him.“
We are into July now and the 49ers won’t have to do anything until August—at the earliest.
