San Francisco 49ers: Should They Sign Reggie Bush?

The San Francisco 49ers aren’t going to be major spenders in free agency, but they could find some value in the second- or third-tier of free agents out there. One of these lesser free agents this year is Reggie Bush, who the Detroit Lions released on Wednesday. Should the 49ers kick the tires on Bush?

The 49ers may indeed have a need at running back, after all. Currently, the 49ers don’t exactly have the deepest stable of backs in the league. Under contract for 2015 are Carlos Hyde, who received only 83 carries as a rookie in 2014, and Kendall Hunter, who is recovering from an ACL tear and has never had more than 112 carries in a season.

To match up to the 470 or so carries NFL teams do every year, one or both of those backs would have to set a career high in carries. Hyde is untested as the bellcow back, and Hunter has ended the season hurt in both 2012 and 2014. Clearly, some more talent needs to be added somewhere, at least as a backup.

Tony Avelar/Associated Press

Plan A for the 49ers is to re-sign Frank Gore, but signing a 32-year old running back to a major deal is fraught with peril. Only 79 times in NFL history has a running back that old managed to reach 100 carries, meaning that any deal for a back that old has to be done with a bit of caution.

Now, the end of 2014 indicated that Gore could join that group—he has some gas left in his tank, even if it’s probably the last gasps of his career. However, there’s no justifiable way the 49ers could give him a contract that matches his salary hit from 2014, when he counted $6.45 million against the cap according to Spotrac. It also would require Gore to accept a second-banana role to Hyde, which is a role he hasn’t had to put up with since he was a rookie.

If a deal can’t be done there, the 49ers have to look elsewhere for a complementary piece for Hyde and Hunter. There’s where Reggie Bush comes in.

This is not the first time Bush has been linked with the 49ers.  On January 1, 2006, the 49ers played the Houston Texans in a game that was billed as the opportunity to draft Reggie Bush, though the Texans did, in the end, pass. The 49ers ended up drafting Vernon Davis, who they have been more than satisfied with.

Then, when Bush was released by the Saints after 2010, there was more consideration of the 49ers making a run at him as a change-of-pace back behind Frank Gore, who by then was fully entrenched as the 49ers' starter. It seems like every time Bush has become available, 49ers fans remember how excited they were about him when they thought they had the chance to draft him after the 2005 season and again speculate about him joining the team.

Duane Burleson/Associated Press

Now, Frank Gore is still a better option for the 49ers than Reggie Bush would be, but Bush does have several areas where he outdoes Gore and would provide the 49ers with a different dynamic out of the backfield.

First and foremost, Bush is younger than Gore. He’ll turn just 30 in March, while Gore will be 32 before next season. That’s still old for a running back, but remember only 79 backs of Gore’s age or older have been major contributors out of the backfield. When you add in those age 30 and 31 seasons, you add 176 more qualified running backs. This isn’t to say someone should go give Bush a massively long contract, only that those two years are very important when it comes to running back aging curves.

Secondly, Bush will probably be cheaper than Gore. Bush only counted $2.9 million against the salary cap in 2014, according to Spotrac, and is unlikely to command much more than that on the open market. If negotiations hit a wall with Gore, Bush still might fit San Francisco’s ideal budget.

Most importantly, however, is Bush’s work as a weapon in the passing game. Bush is far, far less successful than Gore—or even likely Hyde or Hunter—as a featured running back. Last season, he averaged only 3.9 yards per carry, his lowest total since 2008.

In the passing game, however, Bush is still a very solid option. Pro Football Focus charted Bush with 1.44 yards per route run, the 17^th-highest total in the league among running backs last season.  The 49ers used it so rarely that none of their backs qualified for the table. On a limited sample size, Bruce Miller put up 1.31 yards while Carlos Hyde, Frank Gore and Alfonso Smith were all under .7 yards per route run. Yes, some of the reason for the lack of receiving yardage by backs last season was Greg Roman’s scheme, but none of the 49ers weapons are exactly the same sort of threats in space that Bush still can be.

Jeff Chiu/Associated Press

This is important because I believe the screen game is something that has been missing from the San Francisco offense for years. The last time a 49ers running back had more than 30 receptions in a season was 2010—that’s the entire Greg Roman era, entirely ignoring running backs in the passing game.

There was a time when Frank Gore was good for 50 or more receptions a season on dump offs and screens. That’s something the 49ers should return to, especially considering the issues the 49ers had in pass protection last season. Screens lure pass-rushers in to gain big yardage by forcing them to slow their assault on the quarterback in order to prevent a small pass from chewing up massive yardage.

Short routes run by backs on regular passing plays also would give Colin Kaepernick another option when plays break down. Most of Kaepernick’s sacks last season came on plays that simply failed to fire—the average sack came 3.72 seconds after the snap, fourth-longest in the league.  Having an option other than tucking and running would give the San Francisco offense one more way to avoid those harmful sacks—even a one- or two-yard gain is better than nothing.

Bush is also used to working as part of a rotation in the backfield. In 2014, he split time with Joique Bell and Theo Riddick. He’s no longer really physically able to give a team 200-plus carries a season—but that’s not what the 49ers are looking for. That’s Carlos Hyde’s role to succeed or fail in. The running back the 49ers add as a backup will have to be accepting of the fact that they are firmly behind Hyde on the depth chart, at least to start with.

So, in some ways, Bush would make a lot of sense for the 49ers. However, does he make the most sense?

Alex Brandon/Associated Press

Assuming the 49ers can’t re-sign Frank Gore for the moment, a receiving running back makes a lot of sense. Bush, however, is far from the top receiving running back on the market at this point.

Also available at the moment are Shane Vereen, Ryan Mathews and Knowshon Moreno—who I’d rank in roughly that order. All three can provide the same extra dimension out of the backfield, and are younger than Bush and, frankly, offer more as an all-around running backs than Bush has offered in several years.

Vereen and Mathews especially are acceptable alternatives to Gore. If the thought is that you want a complementary back to Carlos Hyde rather than two backs who excel at the same sort of skills, then Vereen and Mathews would better allow the 49ers to explore a screen game to complement Hyde’s bruising style and would be better signings than Gore.

Of course, there’s no way to know precisely what new offensive coordinator Geep Chryst wants to do in the passing game.  In his time as offensive coordinator with San Diego in 1999 and 2000, he often used Terrell Fletcher and Fred McCrary as receiving options out of the backfield. But that’s a very small sample size from a long time ago. It’s possible the 49ers will just stick to a power rushing game, which would have Gore be the best available option.

Bush is probably best as just a fallback option. He’s liable to be cheaper than Gore, Vereen, Mathews or Moreno but not as productive. He would fit with the team’s needs. However, there are better options available if the 49ers can fit them under their salary cap.

Bryan Knowles is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report, covering the San Francisco 49ers.  Follow him @BryKno on twitter.