49ers' Kyle Shanahan Says Brandon Aiyuk Has Been 'Extremely Distant' Since Knee Injury

Brandon Aiyuk has not played this season after suffering a torn ACL and MCL in Week 7 of the 2024 campaign, and San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan said Thursday he hasn't heard much from the wide receiver since the setback.

Shanahan described Aiyuk as "extremely distant since he got hurt," per Matt Barrows of The Athletic.

The comments come after the 49ers placed him on the reserve/left squad list on Saturday, which officially ended his 2026 season and signaled his time with the NFC West team could be coming to a close.

That writing seemed to be on the wall before that official move, as Dianna Russini and Michael Silver of The Athletic reported in November that San Francisco voided the receiver's guaranteed money for 2026 after he "failed to attend meetings and declined to participate in other team activities."

Aiyuk and the 49ers went through a contract stalemate leading up to the 2024 season before they finally agreed to a four-year, $120 million extension that suggested he would be with the team for the long-term future.

Yet that is no longer the case.

It surely isn't the end of his tenure he or the 49ers envisioned when they selected him with a first-round pick in the 2020 NFL draft. He helped lead them to three straight NFC Championship Games and a Super Bowl appearance from the 2021 campaign through the 2023 one and quickly established himself as a key part of the offense.

Aiyuk posted back-to-back seasons with more than 1,000 receiving yards in 2022 and 2023 and seemed to be a franchise building block heading into 2024 after agreeing to the extension.

The injury changed that timeline, and now his future with the only NFL team he has ever known is very much in doubt.