When was Christian McCaffrey traded?

Christian McCaffrey is one of the top running backs in the NFL today. Currently playing for the San Francisco 49ers, CMC, as he is often referred to, started playing in the professional league with the Carolina Panthers. McCaffrey was born on June 7, 1996, in Castle Rock, Colorado, and grew up with his brothers learning the fundamentals of football from their father. For his higher education, McCaffrey went to Stanford University and played for the Stanford Cardinals’ football team where he was named to the First-team All-Pac-12 team two times in 2015 and 2016.

As a freshman in 2014, McCaffrey had to share the running back duties with two other players resulting in less game time. But he saw much more game time in his sophomore season in which he finished with over 2,000 rushing yards on his way to a Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Year Award as well as the AP College Football Player of the Year Award. The Carolina Panthers picked Christian McCaffrey as the eighth overall choice in the 2017 NFL Draft, making him the second running back selected that year. Leonard Fournette was picked earlier, going fourth overall.

Also Read:Christian McCaffrey contract

Christian McCaffrey Trade

The Carolina Panthers traded McCaffrey to the San Francisco 49ers on October 20, 2022. At the time when the Panthers traded their former star running back, the team was looking to add value to their draft picks. In return for the McCaffrey trade, the Panthers received a second, a third, and a fourth-round pick in 2023 and a fifth-round pick in 2024.

As for the 49ers, they were struggling on the offensive side of the ball and their record was just 3-3 from through the first 6 games. Furthermore, the 49ers were already sold on McCaffrey during the 2017 NFL Draft but couldn’t take him as he was already off the board.

To add another layer of interest to the whole trade scenario, Kyle Shanahan, the 49ers coach, is the son of Mike Shanahan, the former legendary coach under whom Chritian’s father Ed McCaffrey played in Denver for the Broncos in the '90s. As a result, both the families knew each other very well making this a perfect fit.

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Christian McCaffrey with the 49ers

Since arriving in San Francisco, McCaffrey has been a revelation for the team. He played in 11 games in 2022 for the 49ers and rushed for 746 yards with 6 rushing touchdowns. In the air, he added a further 464 yards on 52 receptions and 4 touchdowns adding some juice to the struggling offense. The 49ers lost just one game after McCaffrey arrived in 2022 and marched to the playoffs easily winning the NFC West.

Currently, in 2023, McCaffrey has resumed from where he left off the past year. Through 14 games he is just 8 yards shy of 1,300 rushing yards on the season with three games still left. He has 13 rushing touchdowns and 7 receiving touchdowns with over 500 receiving yards. There is no question of how good he has been for the 49ers and is arguably the MVP of the team at the moment.

Christian McCaffrey with the Panthers

McCaffrey started his NFL journey with the Carolina Panthers when they selected him with the number 8 pick overall in the 2017 NFL Draft. He spent nearly 5.5 years in Carolina where he had back-back 1,000 plus rushing yard games in 2018 and 2019. In 2019, he also recorded over 1,000 receiving yards as well.

The 2020 and the 2021 seasons were particularly difficult for McCaffrey as he played in only 3 and 7 games respectively. In the 2020 season, McCaffrey suffered a high-ankle sprain in a week 2 game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers leading him to miss several games. He came back in a week 9 game against the Kansas City Chiefs only to suffer a shoulder injury which kept him out for the rest of the season.

In 2021, he got off to a flying start rushing for over 100 yards in the first two games. But once again he suffered injuries in the season which forced him to miss several games. Overall, things were not working out well for the Panthers and they needed more weapons on the team which was possible by offloading their former star running back.