After discussing the compensation and the price, did the 49ers come out ahead when they traded for Bryce Huff?
Now that we have the official compensation between the San Francisco 49ers and Philadelphia Eagles for the Bryce Huff trade, some outlets have skipped the part to see how Huff performs on the field to give each team a grade for the trade.
Huff joins the Kris Kocurek rehab center. The same place that saw Arden Key, Samson Ebukam, and Charles Omenihu flourish and leave the 49ers for bigger contracts. Huff is arguably the most accomplished pass rusher to complement Nick Bosa since Dee Ford, considering he’s five years younger than Leonard Floyd.
If Huff produces, the 49ers will be more than happy to pay his $17.1 million option in 2026. The near $8 million gamble for what could amount to a fourth-round pick made too much sense for San Francisco.
ESPN’s Seth Walder gave the 49ers a B+ for the Huff trade:
49ers get: Edge Bryce Huff
Eagles get: 2026 midround draft pick
49ers’ grade: B+
The 49ers are betting that Huff’s 2024 season was an outlier — not a sign of what’s to come.
A year ago, Huff was a high-end free agent who signed a three-year, $51.1 million deal with the Eagles after showing serious pass-rushing chops with the Jets. Despite questions about his run defense, it seemed well worth it at the time. From 2020 to 2022, Huff recorded a 26% pass rush win rate at edge — a top-10 number at the position had he qualified — in a situational pass-rushing role. The sacks followed when Huff got more playing time in 2023, with 10 that season before hitting free agency.
But Huff’s numbers immediately dropped in Philadelphia. His win rate fell to a career-low 19% (which is still higher than average), but the sacks weren’t there (2.5) and his playing time dipped before he missed time in the second half of the season to have wrist surgery. He was healthy for the postseason but inactive for the Super Bowl — a clear sign of what Philadelphia thought about his play.
The 49ers have been looking for a quality edge rusher opposite Nick Bosa. Their biggest investment in that area is first-round pick Mykel Williams, but Huff is another swing.
The Eagles have former first-rounder Nolan Smith Jr., a couple of free agent signings in Azeez Ojulari and Josh Uche, and an up-and-coming pass rusher in Jalyx Hunt. Watching how Philadelphia used its edge rushers, it was clear that Huff was a miscast.
I saw Huff drop into coverage a couple of times a game and be asked to play the strong side, taking on pulling offensive linemen in the running game. You don’t need to be an expert to understand that’s not Huff’s expertise.
Still, Huff’s “struggles” would have been upgrades from Floyd, Yetur Gross-Matos, and Sam Okuayinonu. Each of the latter three had a win percentage significantly lower than Huff’s in 2024. Whether it’s win pressure percentage or another advanced metric, Huff clears the non-Nick Bosa pass rushers on the roster.
Walder continued to lay out how the 49ers are coming out ahead in the Huff trade:
This is a pretty reasonable play for San Francisco. As poorly as Huff played last season, there’s still plenty to like in his history, and his pass rush win rate remained solid despite his struggles. His pass rush get-off (time to cross the line of scrimmage) has bounced around, from 0.8 seconds in 2021 to an absurd 0.67 in 2022 to 0.75 in 2023 and 0.79 in 2024.
Though that shows Huff slowing down, it’s still a better-than-average get-off for an edge rusher. The 49ers could put Huff back into a situational pass-rushing role — with Williams handling run downs — which would probably suit his skill set better. And if there is anyone who can get more out of Huff, perhaps it is 49ers defensive coordinator Robert Saleh, who coached Huff with the Jets from 2021 to 2023.
Critically, the 49ers are not paying full price. As Field Yates laid out, the 49ers will pay Huff just under $8 million this year after he restructured his deal ahead of this trade. That, plus a Day 3 draft pick, seems like a worthwhile risk for a team with Super Bowl aspirations and a pass-rush need.
Those get-off times referenced in the first paragraph are impressive. However, it’ll always come back to price.
The 49ers are paying Huff a million less per year than Gross-Matos and the same as the likes of Mike Danna, Ebukam, and lesser-known names such as Patrick Jones from the Panthers. If Huff makes the most of his opportunities, his $16.5 option next season will look like a steal.