Asked what that would look like, Aiyuk said simply, “being a champion.”

From there, things appeared to get more contentious after Lynch insisted at the league meetings in March that the team wanted to pay Aiyuk. After those comments, Aiyuk posted a series of emojis to his Instagram story that translated to “money talks, bulls— walks.”

April’s NFL draft brought another important benchmark in the negotiations. At the time, Lynch and Shanahan made it clear that they would listen to calls on their receiver just as they would any other player but still had no desire to move on from Aiyuk.

“I’ve communicated on many occasions: our wish is that he’s here and part of the Niners for the rest of his career,” Lynch said in April. “We’re working through that. … I can say we’re having good talks, and I’m just going to leave it at that.”

Because of that, a trade involving Aiyuk was always going to require a substantial return coming to San Francisco. During draft weekend, no deals were ever close, and Lynch and Shanahan again emphasized the desire to re-sign Aiyuk, even after spending their first-round pick (No. 31 overall) on Pearsall.

The Niners selecting Pearsall offered some insight into the state of the relationship between the team and Aiyuk, who played briefly with Pearsall at Arizona State. Moments after the pick, Aiyuk texted Lynch and Shanahan, “Fire pick, I can’t lie.”

Aiyuk stayed away from the team’s offseason program and he also did not show up for the full-squad minicamp in early June, incurring more than $101,000 in fines as the negotiations reached a temporary stalemate.

In the meantime, other receivers around the league reeled in big contracts:

Those deals simultaneously provided an outline for a potential Aiyuk deal and drove his price higher, which contributed to his eventual trade request.

Just before the Niners opened training camp on July 23, Aiyuk officially requested a trade. Even after that, Lynch insisted that Aiyuk was likely to stick around at least through this season, with sources telling ESPN that other teams had reached out about trading for Aiyuk only to be told that the Niners had no interest in dealing him.

“We fully intend on Brandon being a Niner moving forward,” Lynch said July 23. “We’re always open to listen to things but like I said, we expect Brandon to be an integral part of our team like he has been and excited about that.”

Aiyuk then reported to training camp with his teammates, though he did not participate in any practices. He did, however, take part in meetings and watched practices from the sideline.

Despite a wild week, an Aiyuk trade to the Steelers or any other team never materialized, and the sides restarted the discussions that finally yielded an extension. Before Thursday’s deal, Aiyuk was slated to play the 2024 season under the fifth-year option that came standard with the rookie contract he signed in 2020, which would have paid him $14.124 million.