49ers defense gets slapped with embarrassing spot in league-wide rankings

The San Francisco 49ers spent the bulk of their offseason making moves to wholly upgrade and improve the defense, which included (but weren't limited to) bringing back coordinator Robert Saleh from his head-coaching tenure with the New York Jets, parting ways with older and expensive veteran options on the roster and then using three of their first five picks in the 2025 NFL Draft on defensive players.

Those efforts didn't exactly impress the folks over at Pro Football Network, though.

According to their 32-team analysis heading toward training camp and the regular season, the Niners defense ranks a lowly 26th overall, just one spot ahead of their NFC West rivals, the Arizona Cardinals, who also spent considerable effort trying to upgrade their own defense during the offseason.

Of the placement there, PFN's take does make some sense... somewhat:

"Before falling apart in 2024, the Niners had nothing but top-10 finishes in our database. Like the Cowboys, they struggled massively when the opposition got into scoring position, which was quite often due to this defense’s inability to get off the field (24th in third-down conversion rate).

Fred Warner remains the core of this defense, and Bryce Huff was brought over from the Super Bowl champions — there are certainly pieces in place to return this team to average, if not better, on this side of the ball."

OK, that makes sense. Yet San Francisco's overhaul on that side of the ball points solely to serious improvement over last year.

Let's argue that.

PFN's basis for 49ers having a terrible defense is shaky

True, the 49ers' 2024 defense was putrid, hindered both by injuries and general ineptitude from then-coordinator Nick Sorensen, whose inability to adjust scheme after injuries to key players played a large role in his one-and-done downfall.

Bringing Saleh back alone effectivelly upgrades the defense in itself, and what was a shoddy run defense a year ago has widely been seen as now fixed, particularly after grabbing run-stuffing defensive linemen via the draft, namely Mykel Williams, Alfred Collins and C.J. West, rookies who'll be tasked with an immediate impact. And that'll hopefully turn the page on what was the NFL's fourth-worst scoring defense from a year ago.

From that vantage point, the only direction is up.

Now, one can get behind the argument the Niners will suffer after key offseason losses like linebacker Dre Greenlaw, defensive tackle Javon Hargrave, safety Talanoa Hufanga and cornerback Charvarius Ward. All four of those names are Pro Bowl-caliber contributors, and tasking rookies or second-year pros (as is the case with Renardo Green for Ward) will be a tall order.

But, as PFN also noted, it's not as if San Francisco's defense wholly lacks talent. Warner's presence alone adds prowess, and one might expect All-Pro defensive end Nick Bosa to bounce back from an injury-plagued 2024 campaign, too, his burden lessened by the arrival of Huff.

While the 49ers may be a few proven pieces away from fielding a top-10 defense, they're far removed from the bottom-feeding unit PFN feels they'll be.