The San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan began OTAs with a powerful message that he hopes inspires a bounce-back season in 2025. originally appeared on Athlon Sports.
Sometimes “Super Bowl hangovers” happen not just to the winning team.
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San Francisco 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan believes that was the case with his team last season.
After a 12-5 regular season in 2023 that ended in a heartbreaking three-point loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LVIII, the Niners tumbled to a 6-11 record in 2024 and missed the playoffs.
Shanahan understands this sequence of events, but believes it still sets his team up for success in 2025.
“The way I addressed it the most, was at our last meeting in January,” Shanahan said to NBC Sports Bay Area. “I just told the guys, I talked about how the season ended the year before, and how when I felt them all come back. I felt guys weren’t ready to come back and I understood that.
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“But I told them how I really won’t understand it this year, not that that was right or wrong, but I couldn’t comprehend it.”
San Francisco will benefit from their season ending five weeks earlier than it did the year before after their playoff push. That time away should help refresh the bodies and reignite the flame that guides them into the next season.
Lucky for Shanahan and the 49ers, there is a pattern here that should predict an optimistic outlook for 2025.
The Shanahan-led 49ers have lost two Super Bowls, 2019 and 2023. The following year each time? Two stinker six-wins seasons (6-10 in 2020, 6-11 in 2024).
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But after the let-down season in 2020? They made it back to the NFC championship game. So the time off after missing the playoffs could prove beneficial this time around, too.
However, it won’t come easy. San Fran saw a band of contributing players leave the team this free agency, which could preview a slight rebuild of the roster around the 49ers’ stars.
“We are going to have a team that doesn’t know what we’ve done in the past, or how you guys have earned a lot of stuff,” Shanahan said. “We need to show them, and the first meeting when we get back, I expect our whole team to be here and for it to be important to guys.”
The nine-year coach later mentioned that every single player on the roster reported to duty on the first day of OTAs this week – that includes the newly-signed veteran leaders George Kittle, Fred Warner and Brock Purdy.
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Shanahan’s message is getting across in a major way.
This fresh start has San Francisco geared up to once again be competitive this season.
Related: 49ers’ Top Rookie ‘Thanks God’ for Brock Purdy
Related: 49ers Sign Punter with Iconic Super Bowl Experience
This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on May 30, 2025, where it first appeared.
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