Why Josh Gordon is too risky for 49ers in the Lynch-Shanahan rebuild

The San Francisco 49ers apparently are the hot new funnel for disgruntled players, which is why Sunday’s game against the Detroit Lions became in part a referendum on Josh Gordon.
 
Gordon, the hard-to-corral wide receiver who reportedly will be released by the Cleveland Browns for getting on general manager John Dorsey’s last nerve, immediately was linked to the 49ers on the basis that he prefers them and the Dallas Cowboys to any other team.
 
This is interesting, as most folks would assume that any player who can’t find a way to repair his career in Cleveland probably doesn’t have sufficient leverage to pick a new landing spot.
 
Not only that, but the 49ers’ alleged need for a wide receiver already was so acute that they needed Gordon in the same way that the Oakland Raiders needed suspension-bait Martavis Bryant. Because even uninspired talent is better than no talent at all.
 
The assumption here is that Coach Y can find the secret trigger that Coach X could not, and that even if Coach Y can’t do it, it’s still worth it, because fantasy sports.
 
Yes, that’s the ultimate checkdown here. Gordon can defy his own demons, whether they be drug-motivation or even promptness-based, and the 49ers should just grab him because he’s on the shelf and marked down in price. It is, in short, asking “why not?” instead of “why?”
 
Only Gordon has spent most of his career providing the “why” rather than the “why not,” and general manager John Lynch always has seemed risk-averse to that category of player. Acquiring Gordon would be a desperate act, based on insufficient data (the 49ers didn’t throw the ball well against one of the game’s best defenses in Minnesota).
 
Indeed, Gordon is really the play you make when you’re running low not just on skilled bodies but bodies, period. The 49ers would need to be shredded at the position for Gordon to become appealing, and truth be told, Lynch clearly would prefer to be less desperate than Gordon at this stage of the season.
 
And certainly less desperate than Dallas.
 
Thus, the fascination with Gordon is removed from any rational context -- he is being canned by the worst team in the game, he is interested in going to a marquee team based simply on the argument that, “Hey, I’m me,” and football rosters are not constructed based on availability alone.
 
This could change come 4:30 p.m., of course, but things always change. But the temptation to play free-range general manager always is greater than the desire of the actual general manager. In short, Gordon is too risky a play for a team seeking stability.
 
At least he is now. Check back in six hours, though, because in the National Football League, as horrifying as this seems, everything always is an ACL away.

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This Sunday, be sure to watch 49ers Pregame Live at 12 p.m. and 49ers Postgame Live immediately after the game on NBC Sports Bay Area and live streaming on the NBC Sports app. Greg Papa, Donte Whitner, Jeff Garcia, Matt Maiocco and Laura Britt will have everything you need to know from the 49ers’ home opener.