Brandon Aiyuk finally applied for reinstatement. Aiyuk will report to the San Francisco 49ers facility this Friday, but Kyle Shanahan has a better chance of suiting up at wide receiver for the Niners than Aiyuk.
The team will see if they can entice any team to trade for Aiyuk, but his offseason antics likely scared off any potential suitors. That leaves a release as the inevitable outcome.
There are still financial ramifications, even though Aiyuk’s salary guarantees were voided a year ago. Let’s walk
through some of those ramifications.
Aiyuk’s dead cap hit
Per Spotrac:
In 2026, the 49ers will need to take on $12,350,790 of dead cap, stemming from his 2024 signing bonus, his 2025 option bonus, & 1/5 of the 2026 option bonus – that wasn’t paid, but was still allocated as a cap charge this season. The 49ers will receive a $4.987M salary cap credit next March for this 2026 bonus charge.
In 2027, the 49ers will need to take on $19,298,580 of dead cap, stemming from the 2024 signing bonus, and the 2025 option bonus allocations.
It’s a total of $31,649,370, with AT LEAST $4,987,000 of it coming back next league year. I say that, because it’s 100% plausible to assume that the 49ers have already begun the process of filing paperwork to recoup as much of the 2024/2025 bonuses as possible. Just how much remains to be seen, and the timing of the salary void, the active/did not report list placement, etc…will further complicate that outcome, but it stands to reason that San Francisco will see an additional cap credit in the near future.
According to Over the Cap, the 49ers are $31.54 million in the red for 2027. But that cap space also accounts for Aiyuk’s $40.47 million cap number.
It remains to be seen what cap credit the 49ers can recoup to offset some of the dead money, or whether they’ve already exhausted all the relief.
The 49ers have had no issues manipulating the salary cap by tinkering with contracts to move money around. We can expect more of the same this offseason, especially if they are hovering around little to no cap space.
