Death, taxes, and the NFL poaching the San Francisco 49ers’ staff. These are absolutes in life. We’ve talked about how defensive coordinator Robert Saleh is a hot coaching candidate for 2026 ad nauseam,
but Saleh isn’t the only one other teams may look for.
Albert Breer mentioned in his MMQB post on Friday that two 49ers executives were candidates for a general manager position in the 2026 hiring cycle. GM vacancies aren’t as prominent as head coach vacancies, but there should be a couple of spots opening up, as there are every year.
Breer had two tiers of candidates. There was “On the Doorstep,” which is a candidate he believes “will be in play” this hiring cycle. Next was his “Closing In” tier. Not exactly top-tier, but names with rising stock. Here you’ll find 49ers VP of player personnel Tariq Ahmad.
Having gotten his start as a recruiting staffer at Rutgers, Ahmad initially came to the Niners in Jim Harbaugh’s first year and has worked his way up since. Most of his experience has been on the college side, but of late he’s split his time on the college trail with also serving in-house on the pro side. A grinder, and a high-capacity, high-level thinker, his level of organization has those around him thinking he’d be a natural running his own shop. He’s one of a few guys who could get looks in the Niners scouting department (senior exec Ethan Waugh is another one, who could be seen in a different light given what the Jaguars team he helped build has done).
Ahmad’s career trajectory could match current Washington Commanders GM Adam Peters’. Peters came to the 49ers in the same role as Ahmad and was promoted to assistant GM in 2021 before he took the Commanders job in 2024. The 49ers had a great 2024 draft, and Ahmad definitely deserves some credit for it. The 2025 draft is also shaping up to be decent. Too bad the first pick got injured.
Ahmad wasn’t the only person listed. 49ers director of scouting and football operations Josh Williams also got the nod in the same tier:
Williams got to the NFL on the ground floor with the Jim Harbaugh Niners in 2011, and has been with the organization since. He was a pro scout first, then moved over to the college side, where he ascended into a national scout role in ’22. After that, the Columbia alum made a big jump into a director’s role where helps run the team’s pro and college scouting and player development departments, as well as its contract negotiations. He may still be a year or two away, though his ties to Mike McDaniel could give him a very real shot in Miami, should the Dolphins decide to go forward with McDaniel.
It’s interesting to note that both of these names got their start back in 2011 during Jim Harbaugh’s first year. That would mean they have seen both dysfunction (Trent Baalke) and cohesiveness (John Lynch), both within the front office and in their interactions with their coaching staffs. To be good at something, you have to see how bad someone is at it sometimes.
So what separates these two? Besides Ahmad being further up at the top of Breer’s list and Williams at the bottom? The biggest thing is that, as of this writing, Ahmad has his own Wikipedia page, while Williams doesn’t have one I could locate. If that truly is what separates the two, then there you go. In all seriousness, Williams has contract and scouting down, but might need to work on other areas to be in Ahmad’s realm.
Between these two, I do think Ahmad is the first to find a job, but Williams wouldn’t be far behind. When Peters left, there was some uncertainty, and Ahmad filled in admirably with the aforementioned 2024 draft class. Not only did he put together a stellar group of rookies, but he also made sure to get the correct reactions from fans for the picks as well, as illustrated by this video I made a few years back:
One thing to note is that good teams are the teams that the rest of the league wants to emulate. It seems like every year, the 49ers lose either a coach or a front office member to another team with a higher title. If the 49ers were a disaster, this would not be happening. This isn’t the first news we’ll have of up-and-comers, and it certainly won’t be the last.
While Kyle Shanahan deserves a ton of credit for the team’s success this year, the front office had to find the right players with the right mindset who could do things the way Shanahan wanted them to. Finding the correct talent is difficult; finding a player with the right mentality for the game is nigh impossible.
