Trent Baalke considered Marcus from a distance. Like representatives from most teams, the 49ers GM met with him at that year’s combine, but San Francisco was not one of the clubs that flew Marcus into their facilities for a more thorough evaluation. What the 49ers had, however, were the assets to afford a gamble.
Holding 13 picks over the draft’s seven rounds, Baalke knew he had room to experiment. There was little chance each new player would make San Francisco’s roster, anyway, so the GM earmarked three or four picks for redshirting — selections to be used on players that would sit out the entire upcoming season under the promise of future payoff. A once-dynamic running back from South Carolina was worth taking a chance on.
As able-bodied backs flew off the board, Marcus watched as the millions in guaranteed money he would have earned as a top pick sailed away. Mercifully, shortly before selection No. 131 in the fourth round was announced, Marcus’s phone rang as he dined in an Atlanta restaurant.
It was the 49ers. The pick was a relief to everyone, even ESPN’s television commentators, who erupted with “There he is!” as if Marcus was the very selection many were waiting on. Baalke knew right away the road that lay ahead. “The odds were not in our favor, or at best they were 50/50,” he says now of Marcus’ chances to turn a profit in the NFL. But the GM leaned on what he had uncovered about Marcus’ character and disposition in researching the prospect, about his work ethic, about how his commitment to the game was always accompanied by a smile. “If anyone was going to get back,” he says, “it was going to be a young man like that.”
Marcus agreed to a modest contract with the 49ers, with just more than $300,000 guaranteed to him.
