Before diving into Fantasy analysis for each team, I'll present a brief overview containing their offensive ranks in my base line team projections as well as any notable coaching or offensive line changes.

And before I present San Fran's info, I need to correct a mistake. Thankfully, someone on Twitter made me aware that I had blanked on updating the past few newsletter projections at the top. Whoops! Let me catch you up on the ones that we missed.

Cardinals projections:

Projected Offensive Plays – (T-23)

Projected Passing TDs – 24.3 (22nd)

Projected Rushing TDs – 18.9 (12th)

Rams projections:

Projected Offensive Plays – (T-16)

Projected Passing TDs – 27.9 (8th)

Projected Rushing TDs – 19.0 (11th)

Seahawks projections:

Projected Offensive Plays – (19th)

Projected Passing TDs – 25.6 (18th)

Projected Rushing TDs – 17.8 (19th)

49ers projections:

Projected Offensive Plays – (28th)

Projected Passing TDs – 28.1 (7th)

Projected Rushing TDs – 22.6 (4th)

Notable coaching changes:

• Promoted Nick Sorenson to defensive coordinator
• Hired Brandon Staley as assistant head coach/defensive specialist
• Promoted Klay Kubiak to offensive pass game specialist

Notable offensive line changes

• Drafted guard Dominick Puni in Round 3
• Drafted guard Jarrett Kingston in Round 6

This offensive line was awesome as a run blocking unit in 2023. Of course, Trent Williams led the way -- he created more yards before contact per rush on runs to his direction than any other lineman  -- but this line was really just mauling all around on the ground game. Pass protection was a different story. The only teams that allowed pressures on a higher percentage of dropbacks than the Niners were the Bears, Giants, Titans, Panthers, Broncos, and Jets. The guard spot was particularly problematic, and there's a chance that Puni (better known for his run blocking) will take over a starting spot at some point during his rookie campaign. Right tackle Colton McKivitz was also a problem. In his first season as a starter, the 2020 Round 5 selection tied for the league-high in pressures allowed (59). The Niners brought McKivitz back for cheap this offseason, and he's projected to start at right tackle again.

McKivitz embodies the current state of affairs in San Francisco. This organization has to skimp in many spots to try to make finances make sense as the front office attempts to retain as much of the core from the recent title runs. As a result, some of the infrastructure has been diminished over the years. That might be felt more in 2024, but this coaching staff has warranted the benefit of the doubt.

Purdy was pressured at one of the highest rates in 2023, and he thrived in those situations.

And perhaps more important than even his passing numbers against pressure was the fact that Purdy navigated pressure well and avoided taking negative plays. He was only sacked 14.6% of the time when pressured, nearly tying Jalen Hurts for the fifth-best mark in the NFL.

In my opinion, the quickest way for an NFL fan to out themselves as a casual is to disparage Brock Purdy. Is he on the same level as our perennial MVP candidates? No, but he's definitely not just some system QB. He's opened up Kyle Shanahan's offense in a way that we've never seen. Purdy is not just executing a system that Jimmy Garoppolo could not, he's providing answers that allow Shanahan to continue to play with and elevate his offensive offering. Oh, and he has done all of this in his first two years as a pro, all while rehabbing a torn UCL in his second season.

Purdy benefits from playing with Kyle Shanahan, Christian McCaffrey, Deebo Samuel, George Kittle, and Brandon Aiyuk. No doubt. No one is arguing that. We all get it.

He is not a "system QB." Of his 4,280 passing yards (fifth in the NFL), 47.5% came after the catch. The league average was 47.8%. Purdy was below the league average. For reference, 61% of Patrick Mahomes' yardage came after the catch. Are you going to call him a system QB?

Purdy is a good real-life QB. He had the eighth-lowest off-target rate in 2023. He has successfully executed an offense that asks him to attack all areas of the field. He's a good real-life quarterback. And he's a great Fantasy QB. After ranking 11th in Fantasy points per game as a rookie, Purdy finished his second season as the QB6 in Fantasy. My projections have Purdy's passing touchdown number regressing substantially, which drops him to QB15 in my projections. But he absolutely could again exceed expectations on the efficiency front. And, really, the difference between quarterback projections after the top handful of elite performers is negligible. The difference in projected points between the QB1 (Mahomes) and QB7 (Stroud) in my projections is larger (15%) than the difference between Stroud and Purdy (10%) at QB15.

I am projecting a 21.5% target share for Aiyuk, a 20% share for Samuel, an 18.5% share for CMC, and a 17% share for Kittle. Truly, every single one of those rates feels too low to me, but I am stretching to get them to those rates, to be honest. It's tough to project target shares for an offense that has this many weapons.

When all three of Aiyuk, Kittle, and Samuel were on the field together in 2023, Samuel actually tied Aiyuk for the team-lead in targets. He and CMC were the most-targeted players in the red zone.

For a larger sample size, I zoomed out and included playoff data across the 2022-23 seasons.

I'm projecting Aiyuk to out-target Samuel in 2024. Deebo has consistently gotten dinged up and missed time, I have him projected for 14.5 games, compared to 16 for Aiyuk. Also, I'm projecting Aiyuk to continue to progress. Aiyuk's target per route run rate has increased from 17.3% in 2021 to 21.5% in 2022 and then to 24.0% in 2023. Even while his average depth of target has also increased in each of those seasons, Aiyuk has still managed to continually increase his target rate. That's wildly impressive.

If you want more gas to hype you up on Aiyuk, his Reception Perception profile is TANTALIZING.

Matt Harmon does an incredible job of contextualizing just how impressive what Aiyuk did at the "X" receiver spot in 2023 was. That RP profile is absolutely worth the read.

Still, for as important as it is to project forward and not become to attached to what has happened in the past, it's hard to ignore the huge discrepancy in PPR scoring between Samuel and Aiyuk when sharing the field with Purdy over the past two seasons. While I project Aiyuk to lead this team in targets and score more PPR points than Samuel in 2024, Deebo absolutely might be the better pick. There are too many players for opposing defenses to worry about, and less than ever are defensive coordinators going to be able to prioritize stopping Samuel.

CMC had 100 more PPR points than the RB2 in 2023. There was a 10% difference in scoring between the Fantasy QB1 and QB2. Even in a historic season from CeeDee Lamb, the difference between the WR1 and WR2 point total was 7%. The difference between Lamb at WR1 and Amon-Ra St. Brown at WR2 was 22%. The difference between only 4%. The difference between CMC at RB1 and Breece Hall at RB2 was 35%! There is no other Fantasy asset like CMC, he is truly a cheat code.

I don't see any reason why he can't have an extremely similar outcome in 2024. I'm projecting him for a similar workload. Injury is always a risk for a player who is going to touch the ball as often as McCaffrey, but outside of that, he carries the clearest projection to a league-altering point total. A healthy 17-game projection for CMC comes out to 388 PPR points in my model, with CeeDee Lamb (371) and Tyreek Hill (368) coming in next. He's who I'm taking first overall.

Purdy and Aiyuk are the two Niners who I draft the most of outside of CMC, and I have landed a decent bit of Kittle as well. Deebo is someone who I rarely draft, just because I strongly prefer Nico Collins, Drake London, Jaylen Waddle, and Chris Olave. He's usually drafted in the same range as those players, and I prefer Aiyuk straight-up over Samuel, so he's ended up as one of my least-drafted receivers. I might regret that if Aiyuk is traded , but my guess is that an Aiyuk trade is a less than 10% probability at this point. I'd be very surprised if he doesn't play for the Niners in 2024. If Aiyuk were to not be in a Niners uniform in 2024, my guess is that both Ricky Pearsall and Jauan Jennings would see meaningful snaps and neither would matter much for Fantasy. I also loved Jacob Cowing's prospect profile, for what it's worth. If picking a dark horse Niners player to emerge in a situation where playing time opened up, I'd take Cowing. He gives me Tank Dell vibes, I'm very excited to watch him and Pearsall this preseason.

I'll be back in your inbox every weekday with a new team preview during the month of July and into the first week of August! Wednesday, we will be covering the Carolina Panthers. If you have any feedback on the team-by-team previews or any questions about the upcoming teams, feel free to send them my way.