The San Francisco 49ers have generally been one of the most exciting teams in the Kyle Shanahan era. However, ESPN's Ben Solak doesn't think the 2026 version of the team will be a fun watch this year. He ranked the 49ers among the league's least watchable teams for the years after grading squads on explosive plays, competitive games, star power and overall quality.
San Francisco's age and injury questions weighed the outlook down, all the way to No. 20.
The 49ers under coach Kyle Shanahan — so long as the offense is decently healthy — have always been pleasantly view-worthy. Even a quarterback injury can't slow Shanahan down — those early-season Mac Jones games in 2025 were hilariously fun. Even as running back Christian McCaffrey, now 30, diminishes
in athleticism and tight end George Kittle returns from a right Achilles tear, I'll believe in a bad 49ers offense only when I see it, and not a moment before.
San Francisco played in only six one-score games last season — fewer than any other team — thanks in large part to a porous defense that was among the bottom 10 in most metrics. Fortunately for the Niners, bad defense and good offense can make for surprisingly watchable games. Take their Week 16 primetime game against the Colts in December. It was the only watchable Philip Rivers game after he came out of retirement to be Indianapolis' quarterback at 44 years old ... and it was because the 49ers' defense was shaky enough to make it so.
The 49ers should be healthier on both sides of the ball this season, so they might just be a boring version of pleasantly good. But 25% of their games are against NFC West rivals, the Rams and Seahawks, and those contests always deliver.
San Francisco enters 2026 with the NFL's second-oldest roster, trailing only Washington, with an offense that ranks as the league's oldest unit. Health has been the recurring theme of the Shanahan era — the 49ers used more than 140 game-day injured-reserve designations in 2024, worst in the NFL, and this preseason the team was already missing 20 players off its 90-man camp roster. With Trent Williams at 38, McCaffrey at 30 and Kittle working back from Achilles surgery, San Francisco's ceiling depends on health it hasn't consistently had.
This article originally appeared on Niners Wire: 49ers ranked among the NFL's least watchable teams in 2026
