Fooch's Note: Barrows tweeted that Banks agent confirmed the 49ers have shown interest.
One of the crazier stories of the last few weeks was the exoneration of former high school linebacker Brian Banks. The former top prospect had verbally committed to USC before he was arrested on charges of kidnap and rape. He denied the charges but eventually pleaded no contest on the advice of his lawyer. The story is pretty bizarre, but the basic gist is that the accuser made up the accusations. Banks was already out of jail, but had been registered as a sex-offender and had a felony on his record. That appears to no longer be the case.
Since his exoneration, Banks has been offered a variety of opportunities to try out for teams. He conducted a workout with the Seahawks last week and received an invite to their mandatory minicamp next week. It looks like some other teams are getting in on the action.
Brian Banks, who is impossible not to root for, working out for SD today. SF, WASH, KC, MIN also have invited him in. More @CBSSports.com
— Jason La Canfora (@JasonLaCanfora) June 8, 2012
Rick Reilly put together a great piece about Banks (and I'm not even a Reilly fan!) and included some updated details. Banks has been training like crazy over the last year and can apparently "dead-lift 545 pounds, box jump 55 inches flat-footed, broad jump 10-plus feet and run a 4.6 40, all at 6-foot-2 and 245 pounds."
The 49ers have had some injury issues at the linebacker position with rookie Darius Fleming out for the year and rookie Cam Johnson out until training camp after getting a procedure done (believed to be a clean-up of his knee). It makes sense that the team would look to bring in some linebackers. They brought in Eric Bakhtiari, who is one of the bigger "winners" of OTAs thus far, given the injuries.
Banks will be looking for the best opportunity to make a roster, or at least a practice squad, so it will be interesting to see who gets the best opportunity to take a look at him. And if the 49ers can snatch him out from the grasp of the Seahawks, well that would be a little gravy.