There is a bright side to the San Francisco 49ers potentially losing defensive coordinator Robert Saleh to a head-coach-needy team — the Niners would be awarded draft picks.

In November, the league approved a plan to help further diversify team leadership and reward teams with draft picks for developing minority coaches and general managers. That means any organization that loses someone to one of those job titles would be awarded draft picks.

The NFL would award San Francisco with a third-round pick in consecutive drafts should it lose Saleh to the Detroit Lions or any other team.

"If Saleh, whose parents are Lebanese American, gets a head-coaching gig, the 49ers would get third-round picks in the 2021 and 2022 drafts," wrote Matt Barrows is a recent mailbag feature for The Athletic. "Those selections would come at the very end of the third round, after the compensatory picks. So we're probably talking about pick No. 107 or so."


While Saleh would be missed, the addition of draft picks would help ease some of the pain of losing the valuable assistant coach. San Francisco, after all, doesn't own a third-round pick in the upcoming draft. That selection was sent to Washington in exchange for offensive tackle Trent Williams.

Barrows notes that VP of player personnel Martin Mayhew is a general manager candidate. Any team that loses two minority staffers to head coach and general manager positions would receive three third-round picks. So, that could potentially mean an additional third-round pick each year into 2023.

Of course, ideally, head coach Kyle Shanahan would love to retain Saleh, who he nearly lost earlier this year to the Cleveland Browns head-coaching job. Shanahan was downright ecstatic that his defensive coordinator didn't land the job.

"I was pumped," Shanahan told reporters in January after learning that Saleh didn't get the Browns job. "I heard on my way into work, so I was extremely excited."

That may sound cold, but it shows how much the head coach appreciates his assistant. Shanahan knows Saleh's time will come, though. He'd love to keep his coaching staff together for as long as possible but realizes that isn't realistic.


"I'm always concerned. I never want to lose Saleh," Shanahan said last week. "I never want to lose any of our coaches, to tell you the truth. I thought he deserved one last year. Whether this game happened or not, it's a matter of time before he becomes one. I keep telling him don't be mad at me (for being excited), because I know he's going to become [a head coach] eventually."

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