All 49ers

Can the 49ers Count on Good Injury Luck Two Seasons in a Row?

Keep in mind, the 49ers are one of the oldest teams in the NFL, they've played 60 games the past three seasons and they had injury issues for years until 2023.
Grant Cohn|
Can the 49ers Count on Good Injury Luck Two Seasons in a Row?
Can the 49ers Count on Good Injury Luck Two Seasons in a Row?

In this story:

San Francisco 49ers

The 49ers lost the Super Bowl for lots of reasons last season, but injuries weren't one of them.

Sure, they lost Dre Greenlaw to an Achilles tear in the Super Bowl, and that hurt. But the Chiefs had injuries too -- Charles Omenihu tore his ACL in the AFC Championship. All things considered, the 49ers were healthier in the playoffs than they've been in years, and they still didn't win the Super Bowl.

Can they count on having good injury luck two seasons in a row?

Keep in mind, the 49ers are one of the oldest teams in the NFL, they've played 60 games the past three seasons and they had injury issues for years until 2023. What can we expect in 2024?

It's probably fair to expect Trent Williams and Deebo Samuel each to miss a few games. Williams hasn't played a full season since 2013, and Samuel hasn't played one ever in his career. It's also probably fair to expect Arik Armstead to miss time, because he missed 13 games the past two seasons, and he has plantar fasciitis, and that doesn't go away.

We also know that Greenlaw will miss at least some of the season with a torn Achilles.

After him, it's anyone's guess how the 49ers stars will hold up. George Kittle is 30. Javon Hargrave is 31. Charvarius Ward played through a groin injury that required surgery this offseason.

And then there's Christian McCaffrey and Brock Purdy. The past 10 years, the 49ers have had an extremely difficult time keeping their running backs and quarterbacks healthy. Last year, neither McCaffrey nor Purdy missed a game. Can the 49ers keep them upright again?

If not, they're in trouble.

Published
Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

Share on XFollow grantcohn
Home/News