For the 10th consecutive year, current NFL players have voted to determine the league's Top 100 players.
The Top 100 Players of 2020 premiered on Sunday, July 26 and began counting down the top players in the NFL, as determined solely by the players themselves. NFL Films collected 970 ballots and interviewed 132 players during the process.
The four-day series aired on Sunday, July 26 and concluded on Tuesday, July 28 with three, one-hour episodes each night revealing players No. 100-11 and a special, two-hour edition of the top 10 players on Wednesday, July 29.
San Francisco tied for the third-most representatives on the yearly countdown with five. Defensive lineman Arik Armstead just missed the cut of the Top 100, landing at No. 104. Here's a look at which members of the 49ers were named to the player-voted countdown and their jump from last season.
Fred Warner | No. 70
Last Year: Not Ranked
Warner finished a standout sophomore campaign with the 49ers totaling 118 total tackles (89 solo) and registered three sacks, three forced fumbles, nine passes defended and an interception for a 46-yard touchdown. He also added an interception against Patrick Mahomes in Super Bowl LIV.
Making his first appearance on the yearly list, Warner emerged as one of the better coverage linebackers in the league in his first two NFL seasons. The former third-round pick's 78.5 coverage grade ranks 10th among qualifying linebackers, and his nine forced incompletions on 86 targets (including the playoffs) are the fourth-most of any linebacker in the league, according to Pro Football Focus. He's also registered 14 pass breakups and two interceptions over his young NFL career.
Jimmy Garoppolo | No. 43
Last Year: Not Ranked
Just a season removed from an ACL injury and his first full season as an NFL starter, Garoppolo led San Francisco to a 13-win season, an NFC West championship and a Super Bowl appearance. He started all 16 games for the first time in his career and registered single-season career-highs in attempts (476), completions (329), yards (3,978), touchdowns (27), rushes (46) and rushing yards (62) in 2019. Garoppolo surpassed Steve Young's 1994 season, where the Hall of Fame quarterback threw for 3,969 yards, accumulating the fourth-most passing yards in a single season by a quarterback in franchise history.
Garoppolo is the only quarterback to rank in the top 5 in yards per attempt (8.4), passing touchdowns (27) and completion percentage (69.1) in 2019.
Richard Sherman | No. 28
Last Year: Not Ranked
Making his seventh-career appearance on the Top 100, Sherman headlined a 49ers secondary that owned a top-ranked passing defense, allowing a league-low 169.2 yards per game. Two seasons removed from an ACL injury, Sherman allowed a passer rating of just 45.3 over the entire season, including in the Super Bowl. He surrendered just 29 completions for 227 receiving yards in the regular season and led the NFL with 0.44 yards per coverage snap, according to Pro Football Focus.
According to the program, Sherman is one of two cornerbacks over the past decade that have allowed a completion rate of less than 50 percent while being targeted 250-or-more times.
Nick Bosa | No. 17
Last Year: Not Ranked
The reigning Defensive Rookie of the Year appeared in all 16 games in his first season in San Francisco and registered 9.0 sacks, the fourth-most by a 49ers rookie since 1982, along with 47 tackles, an interception, a forced fumble and two fumble recoveries.
He also started all three postseason games and recorded an additional 15 tackles, 4.0 sacks, two passes defended and a forced fumble en route to earning his first Pro Bowl honor.
According to the countdown, Bosa is the highest-ranked defender following his rookie season in "Top 100" history and is the highest-ranked member of the 2019 NFL Draft class to appear on this year's countdown.
George Kittle | No. 7
Last Year: 29
Kittle started all 14 games in which he appeared and led the team in targets (107), receptions (85), yards (1,053) and tied with Kendrick Bourne for a team-high and career-high five touchdowns. The former fifth-round pick topped 1,000 receiving yards for the second-straight season, with fewer targets in 2019 and become the first tight end in franchise history to register back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons (1,377 receiving yards in 2018). Earning All-Pro and Pro Bowl honors, Kittle also set the NFL record for the most receiving yards by a tight end in their first three NFL seasons (2,945 receiving yards).
Kittle is the highest-ranked member of the 49ers since Aldon Smith ranked seventh in 2013 and the highest-ranked tight end in the history of the Top 100.
