49ers receiver Kendrick Bourne goes public with desire to stay with team in 2026

There must be something about the Bay Area that keeps Kendrick Bourne coming back. 

Maybe it’s the fog that rolls over Levi’s Stadium in the morning, or the way the crowd paints a sea of red before every home game. Or maybe he just has unfinished business.

After resurrecting his career on a one-year deal with the 49ers in 2025, Bourne is making his free agent intentions known before he’s even hit the open market. 

He wants to return to the 49ers. 

“The year went great,” Bourne said on his YouTube channel last week. “Hitting free agency this year, it’s gonna be fun. I want to go back to San Fran, so that’s the plan, but it’s all got to make sense.”

Translation? He’s betting on himself again — but this time he’d prefer the long-term security to come wrapped in red and gold.

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“I’m trying to come back. Talk to Kyle (Shanahan) … I’m trying to make it happen. San Francisco is home. I’m trying to run it back,” Bourne said on Richard Sherman’s podcast.

Bourne’s candor has always been part of his charm. Earlier this month, he raised eyebrows by questioning whether the electrical substation near the team facility might explain why the grass sometimes turns browns at practice.

He even called himself a “conspiracy theorist” about it, half-joking, half-curious. Yet whatever theories swirl in the background, they clearly aren’t strong enough to push him away from the franchise that drafted him and gave him his first real shot.

Free agency will be “fun,” as he says. It’s also business. And if business aligns with belief, Bourne’s second act in San Francisco may not be a cameo — it could be a long-term commitment.