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Is Christian McCaffrey the 49ers' Biggest Reason for Optimism in 2025?

To be fair, McCaffrey had no restrictions at this time last season, either.
Grant Cohn|
November 17, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up before the game against the Seattle Seahawks at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-Imagn Images
November 17, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) warms up before the game against the Seattle Seahawks at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-Imagn Images | Kyle Terada-Imagn Images

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San Francisco 49ers

The 49ers are coming off a miserable 6-11 season and they didn't do much the past couple months to improve their roster in the short term. So what's the biggest reason for optimism heading into 2025?

CBS Sports says it's the fact that Christian McCaffrey is back healthy.

"The San Francisco 49ers' season literally got off on the wrong foot on Day 1 with Christian McCaffrey being sidelined for the bulk of the year due to an Achilles injury," writes CBS Sports' Tyler Sullivan. "McCaffrey was able to return in mid-November, but then suffered a PCL injury in his right knee that put him on the shelf for the rest of the year. Looking towards 2025, McCaffrey currently has zero restrictions, so he's all systems go at the moment, which is ideal for the Niners' hopes of rebounding after a 6-11 season."

To be fair, McCaffrey had no restrictions at this time last season, either. Then he went down with bilateral Achilles tendonitis after a week of training camp. That's an overuse injury that could pop up at any time.

McCaffrey isn't young anymore. He'll be 29 in June. When he returned from his Achilles injuries last season, he didn't run the ball particularly well -- he averaged just 4.0 yards per carry. Which means there's a significant chance he won't be as effective or as durable as he was in the past.

That's why I think Robert Saleh is the 49ers' biggest reason for optimism in 2025. The 49ers always have had a defensive identity under Kyle Shanahan and Saleh is one of the best defensive coaches in the NFL. He could turn the 49ers defense into a top-10 unit right away.

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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.

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