Attrition Crushes Backfields of Packers, 49ers

The last men standing for the San Francisco 49ers going into a game against a porous Green Bay Packers run defense are Jerick McKinnon and JaMycal Hasty.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – You can never have enough running backs.

The Green Bay Packers and San Francisco 49ers went into this season with an abundance of talent at that position. With Aaron Jones, Jamaal Williams and second-round pick AJ Dillon, the Packers were absolutely loaded. So were the 49ers with playoff nemesis Raheem Mostert joined by Tevin Coleman, Jeff Wilson and Jerick McKinnon

Instead, for Green Bay, Jones might miss a third consecutive game with a calf injury and Williams and Dillon were placed on the team’s COVID-reserve list this week. For the 49ers, Mostert and Wilson are on injured reserve and Coleman won’t play due to injury.

So, in what should have been a heavyweight showdown, the teams might be riding the legs of a couple practice-squad players on Thursday.

The Packers’ remaining backs, Dexter Williams and Tyler Ervin, have 15 carries in their careers. Williams, a sixth-round pick last year who has spent the season on the practice squad, is the logical choice to take the role of No. 1 back. He had five carries as a rookie.

The last men standing for the Niners going into a game against a porous Packers run defense are McKinnon and JaMycal Hasty.

McKinnon is quite a story. A third-round pick in 2014 by the Vikings, he rushed for 1,918 yards and caught 142 passes in four seasons in Minnesota. In free agency in 2018, he signed a four-year, $30 million contract. However, he missed the 2018 and 2019 seasons with a knee injury. Back on a renegotiated deal for this season, he’s carried 47 times for 209 yards and caught 21 passes while playing all eight games (two starts).

“I think it’s been unbelievable,” 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan said in a conference call. “To be out of football for two years, and it wasn’t just two simple knee surgeries. It was some surgeries where a lot of people didn’t think he could recover from it. And for him to come back and earn his way to make our team this year, he earned it to be our third-down back and that’s what he’s done a really good job at. And then with all these injuries, we’ve had to use him a ton at running back, which we’re excited to do because he’s shown he can do that, too. We won’t hesitate at all to put him back in at running back. I like getting him the ball. I expect us to give it more to him going forward.”

Hasty is an undrafted rookie from Baylor, where he ran for almost 2,000 yards and caught 15 passes in four seasons. At the Scouting Combine, he measured 5-foot-8 and ran his 40 in 4.55 seconds. He failed to make the roster but, after starting the season on the practice squad, he’s carried 32 times for 132 yards.

“The hardest thing is the continuity,” Shanahan said. “We’ve got a lot of backs who run the ball well. We’ve lost all of our backs that we had on our roster from last year, so that has been a challenge, but these guys who have come in have done a good job, too. To go with that, (we’re on) our third center. We’ve got all the guys who are capable, there’s no doubt, and they’ve shown that and that’s why they’re here. But the continuity is real. The more you play together, the better you do.”

Green Bay ranks 22nd in the NFL with 4.65 yards allowed per carry. After getting roasted by Minnesota’s Dalvin Cook last week and by Mostert in last year’s NFC Championship Game, the Packers’ run defense will be under a giant microscope on Thursday.

It’s knowing what your assignment is and then filling the correct hole. And so, you know, we’ve thrown a lot at these guys over the last day. It’s always tough to prepare on just a couple days worth of work and cram it into just a few hours. So, there’s a lot of learning going on, but you know, a lot of times when you have these short weeks you scale back what you’re going to try and do so that your players can go out there, they can play fast and, you know, we know it’s going to take all 11. I’ve got a lot of respect for San Francisco and what they’re able to do, really in every phase. So, we’re going to have to be on top of our game and we’re going to have to bring our ‘A’ game. We’re going to have to bring a lot of energy and effort and just go out there and execute.”