The San Francisco 49ers drafted Connor Colby in the seventh round. By Week 2, he was starting at left guard due to a couple of injuries ahead of him on the depth chart.
Welcome to the Niners, Connor.
Colby came into the NFL with experience at multiple positions as a 4-year starter out of Iowa. Colby’s height, 40, and broad jump were all upper echelon, but his arm length was in the single percentile.
It didn’t take long to see the positives and negatives in Colby’s game. You can see the 40 and broad jump when Colby fires out of his stance. Colby looked comfortable working laterally or working to the second level. He did a nice job, all things considered, at latching onto linebackers. You can’t have a base as wide as Colby’s without being a natural athlete.
However, when somebody attempted to cross Colby’s face or made him change direction, it was a different story.
The Cardinals found a way to isolate Josh Sweat on Colby. The seventh rounder went from looking like he belonged one week to looking like a player who shouldn’t step onto the field the next. It was a rough Week 3 outing in a game where Colby had eight blown blocks, with seven of them coming in pass protection.
From there, teams caught on, and Colby was never the same. The rookie ended up appearing in Week 8, but for only 25 snaps. We wouldn’t see him take meaningful action again for the rest of the year.
Basic Info
Age: 23
Experience: 1 accrued season
Height: 6’5
Weight: 309 pounds
Cap Status
Colby enters the second year of his rookie contract. His base salary in 2026 is $1.005 million. He gets the second installment of his $25,418 signing bonus. If the 49ers want to move on from Colby, they’ll have to eat his signing bonus as dead money but save his base salary as cap savings.
Can Colby take the second-year jump?
Right tackle Colton McKivitz said, “I think Connor Colby’s come a long way” this offseason. McKivitz added:
“I think you never know how your rookie season is going to go. It can be really good or really bad, and you learn a lot. Youre kind of flying by the seat of your pants, and you don’t really have a whole lot of technique. You’re just thrown in, and it’s a whirlwind. So to see him play a lot faster right now — obviously, it’s OTAs, we’re not hitting. We’ll obviously see in July, but to see him kind of come out of his rookie season and take a breath, and then come in a little more rejuvenated, understands the scheme a little more, to see him come out and play faster, it’s good to see, just a great guy.”
Here’s what offensive line coach Chris Foerster had to say about Colby when he spoke to the media this spring:
“The biggest improvement most guys make is between Year 1 and Year 2. And so you’re going to see a big jump in Connor Colby, and he has to make a big jump. Because when he stopped playing, it was not real good for him. So Connor has made a nice jump, as far as you can tell.”
Colby just turned 23. Iowa prospects tend to last in this league. He didn’t finish the season the way he wanted to, but there’s plenty for Colby to build on from his rookie season.
To me, Colby was at his best when he was the aggressor. Jump sets favored him, whereas waiting back and letting defenders get into his chest caused the most problems. Colby will need to find the fine line. If he can, that could be the difference between him starting and not starting.
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