A big question moving forward for the San Francisco 49ers will be if they should trade up to select the best receiver, in most peoples minds, in this year’s draft class, Sammy Watkins.

Doing so would be a costly move by the way of draft picks, not really so with cash because of the new rookie wage scale. Moving up to select Watkins would be very similar to when the Falcons traded up from the 27th pick to the sixth pick to select Julio Jones.

Watkins is going to be projected right in that area, maybe not that high, but around the 10th selection, and the 49ers would have to be moving up from someplace around that 27th pick.

With the cost being almost identical for the 49ers to move up that far in the draft, we’ll take a quick look at what the Falcons paid to move up. The Falcons traded the 27th, 59th, and 124th picks in the 2011 draft which the Browns used to select Phil Taylor (after a small trade up), Greg Little, and Owen Marecic.

The Falcons also traded the 22nd and 118th picks in the 2012 draft which the Browns used to select Brandon Weeden, the 118th was used in a trade. Most would say that the Falcons “won” this trade, but who knows what they would have done with their picks had they kept them?

So the 49ers would likely be looking at a cost of two first round and two fourth round picks to move up and select Watkins. A heavy price to pay, but the 49ers have suffered from bad receiver play for many years, excluding Michael Crabtree and Anquan Boldin. The 49ers have struggled drafting wide receivers and can’t really afford to miss again when it comes to the weakest position on the team.

Seeing the cost of moving that high up the board, I would not be a fan of trading up for Watkins. Although he is a great player, the cost is just too steep.

The 49ers have an abundance of picks right now but using them to trade up for a single player is risky, if he were to bust it could be crushing. This isn’t to say that trading up is always a bad idea, the 49ers just traded up to select Eric Reid and I’d assume most 49ers fans are happy that move was made.

Trading up is more of an opinion thing, and this year’s draft is deep at wide receiver. They could find a stud wide receiver anywhere in the first four rounds. This year we could see as many as six receivers go in the first round. With how deep this year is at wide-receiver, I think not trading up is for the best.

I’m a fan of using the picks you have and listening to offers, if the 49ers find it to be cheap to trade up, I could stomach the move. Great players can be found in the late first and fourth rounds, finding those players could net four great players rather than just one.

I think staying put is the best choice as long as the picks are used wisely, but it’ll be years before you can really say if a team used their picks wisely, and hindsight is always 20/20.