The 49ers have a void to fill at the linebacker position, and GM John Lynch was recently seen in conversation with a draft prospect who has the skill set to plug that gap.

While the accepted school of thought heading into the 2025 NFL Draft is that the 49ers will focus on the trenches, with obvious holes on both the offensive and defensive lines, a failure to retain a critical member of their back seven has placed an emphasis on a position they would probably prefer not to prioritize.

It was widely reported that the 49ers were desperate to retain linebacker Dre Greenlaw despite his return from his Super Bowl Achilles injury ending before he had a chance to get back to his best. He instead headed to Denver to join the Broncos, leaving the 49ers searching for answers next to first-team All-Pro Fred Warner.

Having been burned on the free agent market last year with a failed attempt to sign Eric Kendricks and the misguided acquisition of De’Vondre Campbell, the 49ers have not looked to sign a veteran from elsewhere as yet.

San Francisco does have an exciting and athletically gifted candidate to take Greenlaw’s place at WILL linebacker on the roster in the form of Dee Winters.

But with Winters unproven after spending much of 2024 behind Campbell on the depth chart, it would behoove the 49ers to take another swing on a linebacker. As such, it wasn’t a surprise to see general manager John Lynch in conversation with a potential day-two pick at the position during Oregon’s pro day this week.

Lynch was pictured talking with Oregon’s Jeffrey Bassa, a Senior Bowl standout who has earned a lot of fans in the process. Draft meetings are obviously no guarantee of selection, but the 49ers’ apparent interest in him makes sense and is intriguing as Bassa boasts several traits that could allow him to compete to start and thrive right off the bat in the 49er defense.

It is a big challenge to task anyone with filling the void left by Greenlaw, whose physicality and speed to the ball helped make him the heartbeat, if not the leader, of the 49er defense.

The absence of those traits when Campbell was playing in Greenlaw’s stead last season was glaring. However, instincts, particularly in coverage, take precedence over the physical abilities the 49ers look for at the position.

Athleticism obviously matters and was crucial to the kind of spectacular plays Greenlaw succeeded in making in coverage during his time with the 49ers (see: the game-clinching interception against the Packers in the Divisional Round).

But such plays were also a product of Greenlaw’s ability to read the quarterback’s eyes from depth. Bassa is a long way from being at Greenlaw’s level in that regard but, in his time with Oregon, he displayed intriguing potential as an instinctual coverage linebacker with outstanding eye discipline.

Bassa trusts his eyes and isn’t easily fooled by backfield eye-candy, with this play from the Ducks’ win over Maryland an excellent example of his discipline and his ability to carry running backs and tight ends one on one in coverage.

A disappointment for Bassa in his college career is that he did not make more plays on the ball. Bassa had just two pass breakups last season and did not register an interception, having picked off three passes across the previous two seasons.

But that was not for lack of trying. Turn on Bassa’s tape and you’ll see him consistently drop into throwing lanes, his proficiency for doing so nearly turning into a pick-six on this play against Michigan.

There’s a case to be made that Bassa could have made that play had he triggered a little quicker, and it is in such situations where playing with a player as meticulous and as gifted as Warner would pay significant dividends.

Yet there can be no doubting Bassa’s speed when he does turn and run.

Bassa could not prevent a Michigan touchdown on this red-zone score for the Wolverines, but the ease with which he erased Colston Loveland’s separation after the tight end motioned across the formation – taking him out of the play and forcing the quarterback to progress to different reads – served as a compelling demonstration of his physical talents.

And Bassa combines his open-field speed with physicality that belies his undersized 232-pound frames, allowing him to regularly shed second-level blocks from significantly larger offensive linemen.

Winters, the 2023 sixth-round pick who displayed promising flashes last season and had to wait an inexplicably long time to usurp Campbell in the starting lineup, is superior to Bassa in terms of pure athletic traits. Meanwhile, Tatum Bethune, last year’s seventh-round pick, also showcased some encouraging play late in the year and will hope to take another step in 2025.

But, entering the draft this year, Bassa is a more well-rounded prospect than Winters was in 2023.

He is a prospect with the play speed, the physicality and the instincts to blossom into an excellent successor to Greenlaw. Winters is deserving of a shot to prove himself, but the 49ers need youth and strength in depth at several positions on defense, drafting Bassa would give them both at linebacker and potentially set them up extremely well for the long term at a position where they were unusually vulnerable last year.