49ers film room: A deep dive into 49ers 1st round pick Ricky Pearsall

A deep dive into the 49ers first round selection Ricky Pearsall.

The 49ers shocked nearly everyone on day 1 of the NFL Draft by selecting wide receiver Ricky Pearsall from the University of Florida 31st overall. Many, including myself, thought that the pick would be used on an offensive lineman or a defensive back first. And it was reported earlier in the day that the team tried to trade into the top 10 as well, suggesting they were ready to make a splash for one of the top offensive tackles or receivers.

I’m not sure Pearsall was their first or even second choice in the first round and by all accounts, he appears to be overdrafted. A cursory glance around multiple draft boards and analysts comments suggests he could have been had on day two in round two or three. But all of that is irrelevant now. He is a 49er and one that Kyle Shanahan is nonetheless very fond of. It’s worth exploring why that is.

First, let's look at his profile. Pearsall’s college career began in Arizona at Arizona State University where he was teammates with current 49ers wide receiver Brandon Aiyuk. He didn’t play much his first year, registering just seven catches for 128 yards and zero touchdowns. After three seasons, he entered the transfer portal and picked Florida over Oregon. He finished with 61 receptions for 794 yards and 7 total touchdowns (5 receiving, 2 rushing) while at ASU.

Pearsall comes in a bit undersized for his draft position at 6-foot-1-inch and 189-pounds. His testing data from the NFL Combine is below. Some of his size issues show up on film where he can have a tendency to be easily knocked off his route and has some issues making contested catches.

Where he wins

Position versatility

The first thing that sticks out about Pearsall right away is his position versatility. He lined up everywhere in the Florida offense, at Z, at X, in the slot, out wide into the boundary, in tight to the formation, etc.

According to Matt Harmon at Reception Perception, “Pearsall took 51.4% of his sampled snaps in the slot, lined up outside right on 21.6%, outside left on 22.3% and was in the backfield for 4.7%. He was primarily an off-ball receiver but at 56%.”

All of this alignment must have head coach Kyle Shanahan salivating at the prospect of using Pearsall all over the field in a variety of roles. Shanahan loves to use his chess pieces to unlock the defense as doing so can reveal a defense’s true intentions. Having a receiver who understands different receiver roles and sees the field well can go a long way toward unlocking the potential for this offense.

Separation

One trait he possesses is creating separation on routes over the middle of the field by attacking leverage and having an understanding of how to use the defender’s leverage to his advantage.

In this clip versus South Carolina, Pearsall is lined up as the #2 receiver in trips, the point man. He’s running a bender over the middle of the field against the safety in man coverage over the top. The safety has inside leverage so before Pearsall cuts across the middle, he stems vertically against the leverage to get the safety to open on top of the route.

Once the safety is even with him, Pearsall plants his foot and cuts across the middle of the field while getting separation as the safety has a hard time recovering. The throw is a bit behind and Pearsall has to make an adjustment that slows him down on his route, otherwise he might have gained a few more yards.

Working these over routes also happens to be one of the ways his skill set translates to Shanahan’s offense and it shows he has a keen understanding of how to run his routes to maximize their impact for the offense.

On this route, Pearsall ends up as the #3 inside receiver in trips after the motion. He’s running the deep over route with the Georgia linebacker “roboting” the crosser. Pearsall carries his route more vertically angled across the field than flattening it out because of where the defender is chasing from.

A flatter route might take him out of the play and force a tighter throw than the quarterback wants. Then he climbs the latter, shows incredible body control, and hauls the pass in.

While working out of the slot here on this next clip, also from the South Carolina game, Pearsall shows how he gains separation by tempoing his release with his footwork and his eyes.

With his eyes locked inside, Pearsall tempo’s his release to keep the defender backpedaling before using his speed to run past him. He gives the defender a subtle head jab inside before sprinting away from the leverage. The defender actually tries to undercut what may possibly be an out route but Pearsall carries the fade portion of the stem up the field and creates separation in the process all because he timed his release and break perfectly.

The ball should be thrown to his inside and carry him up the field but he tracks it over his head while bending backwards and maintaining his separation and makes a phenomenal catch over his shoulder.

On this throw versus LSU, Pearsall shows how he can get separation versus an off coverage cover-6 corner with inside leverage.

LSU is playing cover-6 with the quarters corner to the boundary covering Pearsall and playing off coverage with inside leverage. Pearsall widens his stem vertically and attacks the outside of the coverage toward the sideline.

The corner, by taking away the inside routes, thinks he’s going to run a comeback and works to undercut the route but Pearsall plants his inside foot, then cuts off his outside foot back across the defender’s face. He then climbs the latter again to make the catch.

Where he needs to improve

The biggest weakness of Pearsall’s game is his lack of reps versus press coverage and a below average ability in contested-catch situations versus aggressive corners plus below average vertical speed. He’s not a receiver who’s going to take the top off of a defense. In addition to having a low percentage of reps versus press coverage, he can have a tendency to get knocked off of his routes over the middle of the field, most likely due to his smaller frame and weight.

It’s worth noting, according to Reception Perception, that Pearsall had a 67.7% success rate against press coverage but when defenders got their hands on him throughout the route, he often was not able to shake their contact to get open as these clips above demonstrate. In press, defender’s don’t always get a jam on the receiver.

In contested catch situations, he often struggled too, only catching fives passes in such situations. Once defenders get aggressive with him, he often cannot overcome them to win on the route.

One reason why he can’t create vertical separation is because he doesn’t “stem and stack” the defender. To stem and stack means to 1) neutralize the defender’s leverage by running at his midline and taking away the defender’s inside leverage (stem) and 2) by putting the defender directly behind him with vertical over-the-top leverage (stack). This gives the quarterback a more favorable throwing window.

However, Pearsall struggles to do this despite his speed and athleticism. It’s one area I’ll be watching to see if he starts to improve on.

Scheme fit in the Shanahan offense

Route familiarity

Pearsall’s biggest strengths are his position versatility and athleticism. It’s easy to see why Shanahan selected him. It isn’t just an ability to run the primary routes in the 49ers route tree that Shanahan loves, it’s his ability to run them crisply and cleanly while adding the nuance and detail the routes require, as shown above, that can get him open and make him a threat for the offense.

In Pearsall’s initial interview after being drafted, he stated why and how this is the case: “Just my fluidity in the route running. Nothing throws me off. Obviously, especially in defenses now, there’s a lot of disguise coverages and moving pieces. So being able to run your routes with your eyes up and see moving pieces and understand on the go why everything’s happening so fast. I think I do a good job of that. And then, just how detailed I am in my route running and the quality of it and how serious I take this on and off the field. So I think that’s what separates me.”

Screens, curls, slants, and digs were his top 4 routes run in 2023 with some of his highest rates of success coming on those same routes.

(Source: Reception Perception)

We’ve already covered deeper crossing routes above but some other routes you can expect to see from Pearsall are glance/drift routes, deep curl/hitch routes, and possibly the corner post route.

One reason why he is so fluid is lack of wasted motion or movement. He gets into and out of the breaks on his route stem on time and never loses any momentum or has any false or extra steps. In Shanahan’s offense, the glance and drift routes are ultimate timing routes and are run frequently.

Here, Florida is running a glance route, not quite a slant, not quite a drift. It’s run at 5-steps with the inside foot up as the lead foot. He never breaks his stride even while looking for the ball.

On deeper hitch routes, above, ones that Shanahan calls “read” routes, Pearsall showed that he can effectively throttle down, drop his hips, stop on a dime and get separation by working back to the ball against man coverage.

Pearsall might not be as effective running vertically against defenders with inside leverage but I’ve shown above that he can effectively attack inside leverage and work back toward the middle of the field. On these corner post routes, a staple route in Shanahan’s play action passing game, Pearsall easily creates separation by getting the defenders to turn outside before breaking to the post. He scored on two of them last season.

Running game

While at Florida, Pearsall also showed he can run the ball when called upon as well and is an effective decoy in the run game when he’s not getting the ball.

By this point in the season, Pearsall had already broken off a couple of big runs on this same motion post snap. He was so effective at running the ball in his limited snaps prior to this that the defense devoted a portion of their run pursuit to following him. His orbit motion moved the linebackers out of position just enough to get the offensive line favorable blocking angles.

This play should look familiar to 49ers fans. It’s been stolen and copied dozens of times since Shanahan introduced it with Deebo Samuel back in 2019. And Pearsall has broken a few big runs with it in its very limited usage Florida’s offense.

He shows off his speed where again, he wastes no movement in getting up field as quickly as possible. This is a role he could easily find himself in in Shanahan’s offense and help Deebo save some tread on the tires in the process.

Outlook

Pearsall is a do-it-all type of receiver and that’s exactly what Shanahan is looking to expand his offense. It gives Brock Purdy even more weapons and it might potentially unlock a new dimension of the 49ers offense with Pearsall’s added versatility and speed.

What that immediately looks like in 2024 is a mystery but that’s the glue that binds Shanahan’s offense. We never know in what new ways he’s going to cook up his next offensive evolution but adding Pearsall all but guarantees this will happen with certainty.