There are a handful of scenarios where the San Francisco 49ers could come away from Day 1 of the 2025 NFL draft with a game-changing player.
One of those plays out in a 2025 mock draft from For the Win where the 49ers land perhaps the steal of the draft without needing to make a trade up.
FTW’s Christian D’Andrea has standout Michigan defensive tackle Mason Graham careening all the way down to the 49ers at the No. 11 overall pick.
Graham was a two-time First-Team All-Big 10 selection for the Wolverines after putting up 62 pressures and nine sacks over the last two seasons. He’s a big-time athlete who would have to change positions with San Francisco, but D’Andrea doesn’t foresee an issue for Graham making that switch.
Via FTW:
One of the tenets of Kyle Shanahan’s 49ers teams is a commitment to a deep and athletic defensive line. Graham isn’t a perfect fit moving from Michigan’s 3-4 to San Francisco’s 4-3, but he’s talented enough to make this a moot point.
The Wolverines star would get to thrive next to a healthy Javon Hargrave to give the Niners a pair of inside-out gap-shooters who can flush quarterbacks out to Nick Bosa and Leonard Floyd’s orbits. At 320 pounds, he’s big enough to be immobile against the run. He’s also quick and explosive enough to blast through gaps as a 3-technique lineman between the guard and tackle.
There’s still plenty of time in the NFL draft process for player rankings to move around, but Graham is ESPN’s No. 3 overall player as the NFL enters the final week of the 2024 regular season.
He went No. 3 overall in a mock draft from the Draft Wire. He went No. 5 overall in a mock draft from Athlon Sports where the 49ers take Graham’s teammate, Kenneth Grant.
Graham is a certified game-wrecker who would instantly make the 49ers’ defensive line better on all three downs. If he falls to 11th overall, either something went terribly wrong for him in the pre-draft process, or the 49ers are walking away with the biggest steal of the 2025 draft.
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