The 49ers' wide receiver competition still is in full swing with the preseason halfway gone.
While a number of receivers have flashed, coach Kyle Shanahan explained he’s still waiting to see more from the group as a whole.
“Yeah, I want to see more from all of them,” Shanahan said in a conference call Tuesday. “We’ve got a very good group and they’re all tight and so I’m trying to get those guys to take the spot from people and make it an easy decision.
With our All Access Daily newsletter, stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Bay Area and California sports teams!
SIGN UP HERE “I think we’ve got a lot of candidates to start on our team, guys who have been here and the new guys. There’s two positions, depending on if we start in 12 or 21 and there’s three positions if we start in 11.”
Shanahan and the offensive coaches attempted to spread the snaps out amongst the group throughout joint practices and Monday's preseason game against the Denver Broncos, but limited rookie Jalen Hurd, who was dealing with back tightness.
“Hurd was going to play more, but he had some back tightness all week in practice and then he had a little bit in the game,” Shanahan said. “He definitely could’ve gone, but that was just the decision I made to get him out of there.”
The shortened week for the team played a factor in the decision as well.
San Francisco 49ers
Find the latest San Francisco 49ers news, highlights, analysis and more with NBC Sports Bay Area and California.
“Didn’t want that to be worse with the fact that we have three games in 10 days, so we did that,” Shanahan said. “The other guys we planned on playing awhile, and I thought they did a good job taking advantage of that.”
With Trent Taylor out for four to six weeks due to surgery on his fractured foot, the onus is on the remaining receivers to take advantage of the additional reps they will get in games and at practice.
Rookie Deebo Samuel had the longest offensive play of the game in Denver but Shanahan still is looking for more.
“Especially with Trent being down right now, there’s a lot of opportunities for these guys," Shanahan said. "Deebo had a good play on the reverse or the round, we call it the round, but the reverse he had yesterday. But, that’s what we expect him to do.
“The D-end closed and he’s fast and we expect him to outrun people, but all these guys can keep getting better a lot. We want them to be good at blocking, be good at running the ball when it’s in their hands and they need to be able to get open. Deebo has the ability to do everything, but he’s still continuing to develop.”
Veteran receiver Jordan Matthews lined up in the slot with the first-team offense but Shanahan said that who wins that job still is very fluid.
“That’s what we’ll go over this afternoon,” Shanahan said. “We’ll have two practices to prepare for Kansas City. We kind of think all this stuff out, we give guys different opportunities certain weeks, but by no means is anything set for Week 1.
“We’ve got an idea of what some guys can do, some guys we need to see more from and some guys we already feel like we know what they can do. So, we mix it all around and I wouldn’t look into anything until you guys see our final 53.”
[RELATED: 49ers' new depth chart gives clues about position battles]
Here's the 49ers' wide receiver snap count from Monday night’s match up with the Broncos:
Kendrick Bourne 45
Richie James 32
Deebo Samuel 24
Dante Pettis 11
Marquise Goodwin 11
Jalen Hurd 8
Jordan Matthews 5
Malik Henry 3
Shawn Poindexter 1