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Seattle<\/a> just reached into the 49ers<\/a>\u2019 building again, and George Kittle<\/a> didn\u2019t need a long statement to say how he felt about it.<\/p>\n After reports on Feb. 15<\/a> that the Seattle Seahawks are hiring 49ers tight ends coach\/run game coordinator Brian Fleury as their offensive coordinator, Kittle responded on social media with a simple: \u201csad.\u201d<\/p>\n For 49ers fans, it was a small moment that still carried weight. Fleury wasn\u2019t just another assistant on Kyle Shanahan\u2019s staff, he was a coach who helped shape one of the league\u2019s most unique stars, and someone Kittle has publicly credited for making him sharper in the details.<\/p>\n 49ers News: Brian Fleury\u2019s move hits Kittle differently because it\u2019s been a real partnership<\/p>\n Fleury has been with the 49ers since 2019, first working on the defensive side before flipping over to offense. He became the team\u2019s tight ends coach in 2022, and added the run game coordinator title in 2025.<\/p>\n That timeline matters, because it overlaps with Kittle\u2019s prime, and with years where San Francisco\u2019s offense leaned heavily on tight end versatility: blocking on the edge, selling play-action, and turning the middle of the field into a runway.<\/p>\n In a past profile<\/a> by The Athletic, Fleury explained how his background shapes the way he teaches, pointing to both his experience playing quarterback and coaching defense.<\/p>\n \u201cPlaying quarterback gave me a lot of familiarity with the offense from the quarterback\u2019s perspective,\u201d Fleury said, adding that his defensive coaching background helps him understand how defenses structure responsibilities, and how tight ends can exploit them.<\/p>\n That kind of perspective is exactly what can build trust between a coach and a player like Kittle, whose game is built on nuance as much as violence.<\/p>\n Kittle has already told people what Fleury meant to him<\/p>\n Kittle\u2019s \u201csad\u201d reaction wasn\u2019t just about losing a coach he likes. He\u2019s previously praised Fleury in unusually specific terms. the kind that tells you this wasn\u2019t a surface-level relationship.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s big on all his details on every single play,\u201d Kittle said. \u201cHe knows absolutely everything going on in the offense. \u2026 Sometimes a new point of view can reveal a lot of different things that I\u2019ve never seen before, so I appreciate that from Coach Fleury.\u201d<\/p>\n Kittle also pointed to Fleury\u2019s defensive background as a separator, saying the tight ends benefitted from how Fleury breaks down responsibilities and structure \u201cas a defensive coach.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s the key takeaway for 49ers readers: this wasn\u2019t just a \u201cposition coach leaves\u201d blip. This was a coach Kittle openly credited for helping him see the game differently.<\/p>\n NFL News: What Fleury\u2019s hire signals and what it means for San Francisco next<\/p>\n From Seattle\u2019s side, the hire strongly suggests scheme continuity. Fleury comes from the Shanahan tree, and reporting around the move has noted the expectation that the Seahawks will keep major foundational elements intact, including an outside-zone-based run game.<\/p>\n For the 49ers<\/a>, it creates an immediate offseason to-do: replacing a tight ends coach who wore multiple hats, and doing it while a division rival now gets a direct window into how San Francisco has taught technique and details in that room.<\/p>\n Kittle\u2019s one-word post landed because it captured that reality in real time. Losing Fleury isn\u2019t just a staff shuffle; it\u2019s a personal hit for one of the faces of the franchise, and another reminder that coaching continuity in the NFL<\/a> is always temporary, even for teams that feel stable.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tErik Anderson<\/a> is an award-winning sports journalist covering the NBA, MLB and NFL for Heavy.com. He also focuses on the trading card market. His work has appeared in nationally-recognized outlets including The New York Times, Associated Press , USA Today, and ESPN. More about Erik Anderson<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on 49ers\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Seattle just reached into the 49ers\u2019 building again, and George Kittle didn\u2019t need a long statement to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179618,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[101,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-179617","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-san-francisco","9":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","10":"tag-san-francisco-news","11":"tag-sf","12":"tag-sf-headlines","13":"tag-sf-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179617\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}