{"id":451553,"date":"2026-09-02T23:36:26","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T23:36:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/451553\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T23:36:26","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T23:36:26","slug":"how-49ers-on-espns-top-100-differ-from-nfls-2026-list-nbc-sports-bay-area-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/451553\/","title":{"rendered":"How 49ers on ESPN\u2019s top 100 differ from NFL\u2019s 2026 list \u2013 NBC Sports Bay Area & California"},"content":{"rendered":"

Six 49ers made both the NFL’s official Top 100 Players<\/a> list and ESPN’s competing version for 2026 — but the two rankings tell noticeably different stories about who deserves the most trust heading into the season.<\/p>\n

The biggest gap belongs to Christian McCaffrey<\/a>. NFL players voted him all the way to No. 6<\/a> this summer, a stunning 67-spot jump from a year ago after his 2,126-yard, 17-touchdown Comeback Player of the Year campaign<\/a>. ESPN’s experts, in their own Top 100 rankings<\/a>, were far more conservative, slotting McCaffrey at No. 29 — still a strong ranking, but a 23-spot gap from how his peers see him. <\/p>\n

Fred Warner<\/a> shows the opposite pattern. His own NFL peers dropped him all the way to No. 54 after a season-ending ankle injury<\/a> cut his 2025 campaign short, seemingly weighing the missed time heavily. ESPN’s panel went the other direction entirely, ranking Warner at No. 20 and crediting a full, healthy training camp as reason to expect him to reclaim his standing as the league’s top off-ball linebacker<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Nick Bosa’s<\/a> situation is the most extreme divergence of all. His own peers left him off the NFL’s list completely following his second career ACL tear<\/a>, suffered in Week 3 of last season. ESPN’s experts still ranked him at No. 55, pointing to his production before the injury — two sacks, two forced fumbles and a fumble recovery in less than three games — and the addition of defensive tackle Osa Odighizuwa<\/a> as reason to expect more one-on-one wins once he returns.<\/p>\n

The remaining three 49ers<\/a> landed in reasonably similar territory on both lists. George Kittle<\/a> was nearly identical — No. 46 on the NFL list, No. 47 on ESPN’s — suggesting broad agreement on where he stands after his own Achilles recovery<\/a>. Trent Williams<\/a> (No. 40 NFL, No. 28 ESPN) and Brock Purdy<\/a> (No. 85 NFL, No. 73 ESPN) each landed roughly a dozen spots higher on ESPN’s version, a smaller but still notable gap in the same direction.<\/p>\n

One 49er was left off both lists entirely: Mike Evans, whose ranking would have been worth watching given the crowded receiver room he now anchors alongside Deebo Samuel and rookie De’Zhaun Stribling.<\/p>\n

Download and follow the 49ers Talk Podcast<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Six 49ers made both the NFL’s official Top 100 Players list and ESPN’s competing version for 2026 —…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":451554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[879,878,750,297,8757,90113,11453,101,103,102,104,106,105,25053],"class_list":["post-451553","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-francisco","tag-brock-purdy","tag-christian-mccaffrey","tag-espn","tag-fred-warner","tag-george-kittle","tag-mike-evans","tag-nick-bosa","tag-san-francisco","tag-san-francisco-headlines","tag-san-francisco-news","tag-sf","tag-sf-headlines","tag-sf-news","tag-trent-williams"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451553","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=451553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}