The San Francisco 49ers are either cooler on the top wide receiver prospects than many thought, or recognized that Day 2 of the NFL Draft is where the sweet spot is. Free agent investments also allow the team to be patient when it comes to selecting a wideout. There are about a dozen players who could get drafted on Friday at the position. They all come in different shapes and sizes.
Comparing prospects to NFL players often leaves a lot to be desired, as there’s usually no middle ground. We tend to gravitate toward high-end comps to paint a picture of a player’s ceiling.
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Then there are others who can’t help themselves from hyperbole. “He reminds me of Terrell Owens.” “I see more of a Reggie Wayne.” Or, any 5’9” receiver with a bit of physicality is often seen as the second coming of Steve Smith.
We’ll do our best to avoid comparing college kids to Hall-of-Fame-type players, but there are no promises. Today, we’re using NFL IQ to help us identify how prospects with similar measurables have panned out in the NFL.
Let’s start with a player who should have been drafted in the first round if not for injury. He has proved that he can win in NFL ways and would be in the conversation for teams in the teens had he not suffered a hamstring injury.
Louisville WR Chris Bell
You don’t have to worry about Bell catching the ball. His 10″ hands are in the 87th percentile. Bell had the fourth-highest target share in this wide receiver class, ran a route tree that had 32 percent of his routes down the field, and still only had four drops. It looks like that when he catches the ball. The pigskin doesn’t move when Bell gets his hands on it.
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I asked NFL IQ how many receivers over 6’1” with at least 10” of hand length had 1,000-yard seasons. The group’s gold standard is Michael Thomas. The former Saints wideout had 1,137 yards receiving as a rookie in 2016. That increased every year through 2019, where he peaked at 1,725.
Other examples include Alshon Jeffrey, Keenan Allen, JuJu Smitch-Schuster, Jordy Nelson, Jordan Matthews, Marin Jones, and Kelvin Benjamin. There’s another example: a couple of inches taller, but a burner who ate up defenders’ angles, just as Bell did in college. Demaryius Thomas is admittedly a bigger player, being an inch and a half taller, but it would not have been a surprise to see Bell come close to Thomas’s 4.38 40, as he’s already reaching 18 miles per hour:
Thomas had five consecutive seasons in which he surpassed 1,000 yards. He also had three consecutive seasons of 10+ touchdowns. You can spam targets to the players unbothered by contact at the catch point because their hands are the size of a skillet.
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Don’t let Bell slipping to Friday deceive you into thinking he won’t be successful in the NFL. Since 2014, there have been a plethora of wide receivers drafted in the second round who were successful. Tee Higgins, A.J. Brown, Davante Adams, Deebo Samuel, DK Metcalf, Alex Pierce, and Courtland Sutton were all drafted in this round.
Bell has a gear that few his size do. Signs a player is abnormally fast: When you see them running, and defenders either change their angle or the direction they’re running, or fail to get a hand on the ball-carrier. You see that when Bell gets the ball in his hands.
He’s the most aggressive blocker in the draft. Running plays for Bell are another opportunity for him to show you how much better he thinks he is than you. And trust me, this is the kind of person who wants to prove you wrong. That’s what jumps out to me when watching Bell.
It’s why he pops back up after getting helicopter’d over the middle by two linebackers on an underneath route. In an occupation where you have to have a couple of screws loose to compete with the best, Bell embraces the contact and brings the fight to you.
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Pair that mentality with Bell’s Corvette-esque ability to get from 0 to 60, and you have yourself the prototype of what wins in today’s NFL at that size. Bell is a carbon copy of what NFL teams should be willing to be wrong about. He’s worth it. He’s special.
Washington WR Denzel Boston
Boston visited the 49ers in late March. Boston’s profile has been successful in the NFL. I wondered how many wide receivers over 6’3″ with a vertical sub-36″ had 1,000-yard seasons as pros. Mike Evans is the ceiling comp for the Boston architect. He also jumped 37 inches, so he isn’t listed. Boston jumped 35″, which is in the 42nd percentile.
Seven-time Pro Bowler A.J. Green falls under this umbrella. The same with Mike Williams (1,000-yard season in 2021), Kelvin Benjamin, Tee Higgins, Courtland Sutton, and George Pickens.
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Another player who falls into this category and makes some sense as a comp is former Detroit Lions wide receiver, Kenny Golladay. I’d call Boston a more refined Golladay.
Golladay had five red zone touchdowns on 16 targets during his breakout season in 2018. The next season, he caught seven touchdowns on 17 targets in the red area. That is the kind of threat the 49ers need and would rely on.
Boston isn’t as flashy as some other wideouts in the draft, but he knows how to win off the line of scrimmage, stay on his line, find the soft spot in zones, and is sneaky good after the catch. You can see Boston’s elite 3-cone time with his separation at the top of his routes and when it’s time to get in and out of his breaks. I’m a fan and believe he should be viewed in the same group as the other top wideouts in this class.
Ole Miss WR De’Zhaun Stribling
Stribling is the next wide receiver on my board. I’m obnoxiously high on him. I have Bell WR2, Boston WR3, and Stribling WR6 behind KC Concepcion, but ahead of Makai Lemon and Omar Cooper Jr., two players drafted in the first round. To say I’m bullish on Stribling is an understatement. He’s the most Shanahan/McVay type of receiver in this draft.
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Stribling caught 74 percent of his targets last season for 811 yards and six touchdowns. The majority of those were under 10 yards, but you could see NFL talent at the intermediate range. Stribling caught four of his six contested targets in this area and went on to force a pair of missed tackles.
He turns 24 in December, so being on the older side is why Stribling might fall to the third round. He’s over 6’2″ and 200 pounds. The hands are 10″. Stribling ran a 4.36 with a broad jump in the 82nd percentile. He plays as he tests.
The athletic testing isn’t what sold me. It was his usage as a blocker and how Stribling imposed his physical will play after play. However, I used that athletic testing and narrowed the weight to 200 to 210 pounds to avoid specimens like Julio Jones.
It’s a unique physical profile, as only four wide receivers check every box across NFL IQ’s historical dataset. Two went on to have NFL careers: Marquez Valdes-Scantling and Christian Watson.
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MVS was a fifth-round pick who had splashy plays early in his career, but never amounted to more than a WR3. Watson can’t seem to stay healthy, but you’ve seen improvements in his game, and his big-play ability has flipped games for the Packers.
We’ll ignore Watson being 6’4” and use him as the closest comp for Stribling. Think of Stribling as if Watson had to do the dirty work for a team, like being the primary blocker on screens.
Next on the list is the king of the dig route, Germie Bernard. He’s 6’1 1/4, but over 200 pounds. Bernard ran a 4.48, which is plenty fast. His 13th percentile arm length might be a concern, but he has big hands and had a 3-cone in the 87th percentile. Plus, and you’ll notice a theme here, he has 82nd percentile mitts. Strong hands will help offset arm length.
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Bernard lives in the intermediate portion of the field. He only caught 61 percent of his targets, but I watched the Rams’ new quarterback skip a couple of throws his way when Bernard was open by a couple of steps.
NFL IQ confirmed three players who fit this bill, who produced 1,000-yard seasons in the NFL. One of them is Julio Jones, one of the greatest receivers ever. The other two were Courtland Sutton and Alshon Jeffery.
And this is where these queries can be helpful. As somebody who would have no issues with Bernard, he would be an outlier if he were successful. Out of 25 players across 20+ years of Combine history who fit that size and agility profile, the list of three (12%) is concerning.
An argument in favor of Bernard doesn’t help when you look at the list of wide receivers that didn’t cut it. Here are a few recent ones:
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Denzel Mims
J’Mon Moore
Braxton Miller
Deon Cain
Jehu Chesson
Chad Hansen
Every situation is different, and it’s difficult to fail in a Shanahan offense, but these studies make me want someone else to be right about Bernard.
Next up, we have a receiver over 6’4 but with 9″ hands. Fields’ athletic testing could cause him to slip into Day 3. His vertical jump was in the 78th percentile, but he ran a 4.61 and had a shuttle time in the 20th percentile.
You can see some of the issues pop up athletically when Fields needs to create separation on a slant, or avoid contact early in the route. He’s much better later in the route, is generally engaged as a blocker, and has some juice once the ball is in his hands. Fields is probably best after the catch, which is why he shouldn’t be somebody we ignore.
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So what umbrella does Fields fall under? If Drake London is the president of this family tree, then Fields is the local sheriff. There is a place for him in the NFL, even if the ceiling might be a high-end WR3.
For Fields, I used his height, 40, and vertical to see how many players have had 1,000-yard seasons. The answer is zero.
The closest player we have is Allen Lazard, who went undrafted in 2018. He found a home in Green Bay and had several useful seasons, but topped out at 788 receiving yards. To his credit, Lazard was a factor in the red zone for the Packers.
Unfortunately for Fields, this profile does not exist in the NFL, meaning you’re betting against history by selecting him.
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Georgia State WR Ted Hurst
The 49ers met with Hurst twice. Once at the Senior Bowl and another at the Combine, suggesting there’s interest. Hurst is another wideout over 6’4″ and 200 pounds. He has nearly 10″ hands, ran a 4.42. The most impressive testing number might’ve been his 135″ broad jump, good enough for the 97th percentile.
Hurst is as linear an athlete as it gets, but the explosiveness speaks for itself. He’s exclusively played at small schools. Before Georgia State, he spent two seasons at Valdosta State. He was a yard shy of 1,000 yards in 2025. Of those, 595 were air yards. Drops have been an issue. He has 11 in the past two seasons and caught “only” 81 percent of his on-target throws.
Hurst is a receiver who will live on the vertical route tree. The gaudy Combine numbers spit out Christian Watson and some guy named Calvin Johnson.
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When you add in the 40 time, and there’s about a 20-pound weight difference here, you get a player who is the high-end comp. That’s Chase Claypool, who took the league by storm as a rookie. Claypool had the receiving yards to match a season later, but the touchdown production fell off a cliff. After his second season, Claypool never amounted to much.
I passed on Antonio Williams, Deion Burks, and Skyler Bell because I’m not in the business of taking wideouts sub 200 pounds in the second round. Between Ricky Pearsall, Jacob Cowing, and Jordan Watkins, that type of wideout already exists on the 49ers roster. Why add to a logjam of players who already struggle to get on the field?
