A trade was reportedly in place to send Minnesota Vikings receiver Jauan Jennings back to the San Francisco 49ers, his previous professional home for six seasons, until the player himself shot the deal down.
That was the story from Fox Sports’ Jay Glazer on Sunday, delivering the news that Jennings made clear he did not want to return to San Francisco when asked to get on a FaceTime call with Niners head coach Kyle Shanahan and general manager John Lynch:
“It was contingent upon [Jennings] hopping on a FaceTime with Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch and saying ‘Okay yeah I want to come back,’ but he didn’t. He said, ‘Actually, no I want to stay here in Minnesota.'”
Shanahan addressed the matter on Wednesday, confirming the report and telling reporters he was “not really” surprised that Jennings turned the Niners down. He did, however, emphasize that call was friendly in nature.
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“The report was accurate, just not totally, exactly detailed. You can’t talk to players on other teams, you’re not allowed to. We love Jauan. We have such a good relationship with Jauan. I know him real well. We don’t want to do it without talking to him first. We had to agree on some things to at least make it close enough to be able to talk to him.
“When we got on a Facetime with J.J., it went well. It was awesome. We talked about a lot of stuff and he ended up saying that he was happy with where he was. It wasn’t just a definite no at first, but he was like, ‘Kyle I’m pretty happy here, I’m liking stuff.’ When I heard the way he talked and where we’re at, I agreed with him.” It was a good conversation and something that was possible, but that’s why it didn’t go down.”
Jennings played for the Niners from 2020 until 2025, after which he signed a one-year, $8 million deal with the Vikings. His NFL career began as a seventh-round pick in the 2020 NFL Draft and he slowly saw his role expand in the Niners offense, with career years in 2024 and 2025.
That tenure wasn’t without incident, as Jennings previously requested a trade following the 2024 season, which ended with a $3 million pay bump.
The Niners are looking for any receiving help they can get, as their current group of pass-catches has been ravaged by injuries. Demarcus Robinson, De’Zhaun Stribling and Ricky Pearsall are all on injured reserve, while veterans Mike Evans and Deebo Samuel Sr. have both missed multiple games recently.
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Jennings has posted only 54 receiving yards in six games for the Vikings this season, but he knows the San Francisco offense and would have been an immediately usable trade option. Instead, he will continue to play as the WR3 behind Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison.
