SANTA CLARA, Calif. — One day after the San Francisco 49ers’ season ended, running back Christian McCaffrey stood before a crowd of reporters and reflected on the extensive frustrations it had wrought. After missing 13 games with right knee and bilateral Achilles injuries, McCaffrey provided a succinct summary of a year that had begun with Super Bowl dreams and finished with the disappointment of a 6-11 record.

“I think we’re all pissed off in the right ways,” McCaffrey said. “And I think that’s a good place to be.”

Unlike previous letdowns sparked by postseason heartache, the anger left in the wreckage of the 2024 season has much longer to fester.

The 2023 season ended with a loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LVIII on Feb. 11, 2024. From there, the 49ers had 18 days before the NFL scouting combine and 29 days before the start of free agency’s early negotiating window.

This year, however, the 49ers have had plenty of time to assess what went wrong, how they intend to fix it and to implement those plans. When the combine opens on Thursday, they will be 53 days removed from the end of the season with the early free agent window opening 64 days after their season-ending loss to Arizona.

And while the Niners would prefer the smaller windows that come with a deep postseason run, there’s value in getting a longer break to mentally and physically recover and set a course for the offseason.

“It gives you more time to figure things out,” coach Kyle Shanahan said. “It gives you time to go through the things like the cutups and stuff. You can finish most of that stuff all before the Super Bowl. And then you’re ready to go to other stuff like the draft and free agency and all that as soon as the Super Bowl ends. So just being a lot more ahead of that is real exciting.”

In one significant way, having the full offseason to work with has already been beneficial for the Niners. When Shanahan decided to fire Nick Sorensen and seek a fourth defensive coordinator in as many seasons, he quickly pointed out that such a move might not have made as much sense if the 49ers had played deep into January or February.

Shanahan knew well how the pool of qualified coordinator candidates could be limited on the heels of a longer season. In 2023, DeMeco Ryans left to take the Houston Texans head coaching job on Jan. 31. Shanahan eventually hired Steve Wilks to replace Ryans on Feb. 9.

When Shanahan decided to move on from Wilks after a Super Bowl run, that didn’t happen until Feb. 14, 2024. Sorensen was promoted in early March after Shanahan went through an extended interview process.

This time, however, Shanahan was able to make a quick decision and zero in on the coordinator he wanted: Robert Saleh. While there was interest in Saleh for multiple head coaching jobs, he was a clear target for the 49ers from the beginning. If they had again advanced to the latter stages of the playoffs, there’s a real chance he wouldn’t have been available.

Instead, the Niners hired Saleh on Jan. 24. That’s five days earlier than their final game of the 2022 season and 18 days earlier than their last contest of the 2023 season.

“It’s a little bit harder in February, which the last two were,” Shanahan said. “Just being the last team to finish last year and before that, being the second-to-last team to finish makes it a lot different.”

Of course, filling out a coaching staff with more viable candidates available isn’t the only benefit of having more offseason time. While it remains to be seen just how much it will help in 2025, it was no surprise that the 49ers were one of the most banged-up teams in the league in 2024 after playing a combined nine playoff games in the three previous years.

The toll of those seasons seemed to catch up to the Niners in 2024 when they played big chunks of the season without McCaffrey, left tackle Trent Williams (left ankle), defensive tackle Javon Hargrave (torn right triceps), receiver Brandon Aiyuk (torn right ACL), linebacker Dre Greenlaw (left Achilles/right calf), safety Talanoa Hufanga (wrist) and punter Mitch Wishnowsky (back).

Defensive end Nick Bosa, tight end George Kittle, receiver Deebo Samuel Sr., quarterback Brock Purdy, cornerbacks Charvarius Ward and Deommodore Lenoir and guard Aaron Banks also missed games with shorter-term issues.

All of it contributed to a season that, when it was over, left various players planning to take some time to rest and reflect on how quickly the league can get the better of them.

“When you have a lot of success for a couple years in a row and then you get humbled quick, it’s a good reminder of what it takes to be good in this league,” McCaffrey said. “Not that we needed a reminder, but I’m just excited for the offseason to get everybody a little bit of rest, get healthy again, and come back ready to go with a full year in front of us.”

Of course, the most important steps in this offseason still sit in front of the 49ers. They’ve revamped the coaching staff with Saleh and new special teams coordinator Brant Boyer, and they added another experienced defensive coach in Gus Bradley.

But tough roster decisions remain. In the coming weeks, they will prepare for a free agency that will see them release Hargrave with a post-June 1 designation, potentially trade or release Samuel and look to re-sign some of their own key free agents such as Greenlaw, Hufanga and Banks.

Depending on where the cap falls, the 49ers will have around $50 million in space, though some of that will be earmarked for a Purdy extension and a NFL draft class led by the No. 11 overall pick. With significant needs on the offensive and defensive lines, as well as help needed in nearly every other position group, every move will matter if the 49ers are going to return to contention in 2025.

“We can go more in depth this year,” general manager John Lynch said. “I think you always try to look for the positive in situations, and there isn’t a whole lot of positive of not being in the playoff run. You have to make it a positive because we have this time, how are we going to use it? And I think we can focus a little bit more on where we want to go, where we want to evolve in both personnel, scheme, all these things.

“And that’s what we’ll do, we’ll take advantage of the time. In a sense, it kind of energizes you to come back and have this time to really put our minds and our staff’s minds together to come out with the best, to give us the best opportunity to compete going forward.”br/]