Brock Purdy’s payday is on the 2025 horizon, and 49ers CEO Jed York is embracing that vision.
“It’s a good problem when you’re quarterback is one of the highest-paid guys on your team and in the league,” York told Bay Area reporters Tuesday at the NFL’s annual owners meetings in Orlando, Fla.
Purdy must finish out the third year of his especially modest rookie contract — at a 2024 salary of $985,000 — before the collective bargaining agreement allows him to get a new deal, one befitting a starting quarterback who guided the 49ers to back-to-back NFC Championship Games as well as last month’s Super Bowl overtime defeat.
“It’s what the market is. Brock is going to ask for something that no one has ever asked for before,” York said without trepidation. “I don’t know how many players are making over $40 million (annually) as a quarterback right now.”
The answer is nine, including four who crested the $50 million annual mark: Joe Burrow (Bengals, $55 million), Justin Herbert (Chargers, $52.5 million), Lamar Jackson (Ravens, $52 million) and Jalen Hurts (Eagles, $51 million), according to OverTheCap.com. The Cowboys announced Tuesday that Dak Prescott will play out his contract this season that pays him a $29 million salary before he, Purdy and surely others vie for new deals in 2025.
With Purdy still anchored to his rookie contract — a $3.7 million deal as the 2022 draft’s final pick — the 49ers have had the financial wherewithal to pay top-end salaries at other positions, a luxury that threatens to become endangered once Purdy strikes it rich like Jimmy Garoppolo did in 2018 (five years, $137.5 million).
“When we signed Jimmy several years ago, it was the largest deal in the history of the NFL, for three minutes,” York said. “But Jimmy was at ($27.5 million). That’s what the market is and you have to accept the reality of the world.
“To me, the quarterback is the most important position not just in football, but all of sports, and those guys should be paid a lot of money.”
The 49ers’ more pressing contract situation revolves around wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk, who is slated to make $14.1 million on his fifth-year option. Coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch have insisted they want to keep Aiyuk and reward him with a multi-year deal, after the 2020 first-round pick evolved into a 1,000-yard receiver each of the past two seasons.
A year ago, Purdy’s future was in question as he underwent surgery on his right elbow. In his ensuing comeback, he set the 49ers’ record for most passing yards in a season (4,280) and he became their first Pro Bowl quarterback in 20 years.
York is not wincing at eventually having to again pay top dollar for a quarterback, saying: “There’s a lot of planning that goes into it. I’m glad we have Paraag (Marathe), J.L. (John Lynch), Kyle (Shanahan). They’re the ones that are going to figure out the details of it, and I just have to sign the check. My part in that is kind of easy.”
York is adamant about rewarding homegrown stars rather than relying on higher-risk, high-priced signings in free agency. “Brandon, guys that you drafted, I’d much rather pay guys we drafted than guys we didn’t draft,” York said. “We’ll do everything we can, like we have in the past, to find a way to make those work.”
At this week’s NFL meetings, York is expected to ascend from 49ers CEO and replace his mother, Denise DeBartolo-York, as principal owner of a franchise in which their family controls 97 percent of the stakes. While that would give him the 49ers’ power as their lone representative in NFL meetings, he has essentially served as the ownership group’s spokesman for his 13 years as CEO, though that’s essentially amounted to a once-a-year press conference. Instead while deferred to Shanahan and Lynch.
“It’s a move from a family standpoint to just keep this team in our family for generations to come,” York said. “It’s reflective of how we’ve sort of operated. My parents are going to stay the co-chairmen. I don’t think you’re really going to see any change. It’s more of a long-term planning thing. … Estate planning stuff is always a unique process within families. It’s something we’ve always discussed. Watching different family successions and seeing how reading a will can be very different than having a conversation with everybody still around, to walk through and talk through, we thought it was a better process to transition into it smoothly. Being a very close family, I don’t ever anticipate any problems with my family. But it’s an easier, smoother transition to make sure this team stays in our family.”
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As for losing a third Super Bowl since his parents assumed ownership in 2000 from his uncle, Eddie DeBartolo, York is preaching not only patience but the need to take pride in those championship close calls.
“You can’t be ashamed of a successful season,” York said. “Our goal is always going to be to win Super Bowls. Even if we won the game, it’s not like, ‘OK, well, we can take off 2024 because we won the Super Bowl in 2023.’ Our goal is always going to be the same.
“… It’s almost worse to a Super Bowl than not make the playoffs, and I don’t think that’s how teams should feel. I would give anything to have this game or four years ago against Kansas City, you can’t leave and say the whole season was a disgrace. It’s a disappointment to not win, but you can’t destroy yourself and everything you built because you didn’t finish and hit your ultimate goal. That doesn’t mean we’re not going to work towards it and do everything we can to build this thing so we get back there and go win it in New Orleans this year.”