The 49ers have officially named their captains for the 2022 season.
During his Wednesday press conference, Kyle Shanahan announced George Kittle, Trent Williams, Nick Bosa, Arik Armstead, Jimmie Ward, and Fred Warner as team captains. The six received the most votes from teammates, with no input from the coaching staff.
One name not included was first-year quarterback Trey Lance. According to Shanahan, Lance finished seventh in the balloting and chose to go with only six.
While quarterbacks are usually captains of their team, the exclusion of Lance isn’t out of the ordinary for the 49ers. Jimmy Garoppolo was not voted as team captain in 2018, his first year as the starting quarterback for San Francisco.
Whether he has the title or not, Lance will be looked upon as the leader of the offense. If everything goes as the 49ers expect, he will have the title of captain next season.
Injury Report
The week one injury report is out, and it includes two starters. George Kittle was held out of Wednesday’s practice due to a groin injury, and Kittle’s availability for Sunday against Chicago is in doubt. If he cannot go, it will mark the fourth year in a row in which the Pro Bowl tight end missed time, and Kittle has not played an entire season since 2018.
Meanwhile, Dre Greenlaw was a limited participant due to an elbow injury. He should be ready to go against the Bears.
Daniel Brunskill has been dealing with a hamstring since the preseason opener against Green Bay. He was held out of practice on Wednesday as well.
Roster Moves
The 49ers made a few moves to their practice squad, signing tight end Troy Fumagalli and wide receiver Conor Wedington. To make room, the team released wide receiver Willie Snead IV.
The addition of Fumagalli gives San Francisco five tight ends between their active roster and practice squad. With George Kittle’s health issues, having an extra tight end available to pull up to the active roster could be important.
Charlie Woerner is a good blocker and right now that is far more important than pass catching. I say hold Kittle out this game, If they win then hold him out the next game too. A fully healthy Kittle is hugely important and I believe they can win the first two games with Woerner taking the majority of the snaps. imho
I think I’m in agreement with you OC.
Strains and pulls are tricky. I would rather he be full go against the Rams than risk injury against teams they should be able to beat without him (Denver not included).
Hole for Niners this season, if any, would be the unproven O-line. Trent Williams can’t do all by himself.
The Vegas over/under for total receiving and rush yards for Deebo is 1,200 . I guess I would take the over if I had a gun to my head .
Kittle out. First game for a bunch of new o-line starters and the first game of the Trey Lance era. On a wet field. I’ll be honest I’m not feeling good about this game. But I am feeling great at taking the Under 42. I think it’s already dropped to 40.5 so glad i got it early.
Are we all glossing over the fact that Juice didn’t get a captaincy either???
The 49ers schedule this year is loaded with very good teams. Many pundits are predicting 13-4, 12-5, a wild card team, maybe a Super Bowl contender, etc. With a rookie QB, what could go wrong? The game v the Bears is a must win game. It will tell us a lot about this team. I would guess 9-8 and not a playoff team if I had to predict.
Finally, some sanity! Thank you.
I highly doubt that Trey can handle all of the unnecessary weight that Kyle has chosen to make him carry, especially considering how inexperienced this OL is. This scheme requires precision from the OL. Joe Staley says that if just one lineman is a step behind, the entire rushing scheme falls apart. And, with the obvious exception at LT, pass protection looks even shakier! And these factors almost guarantee the failure of a young, inexperienced QB. I feel bad for Trey Lance, but he deserved a little bit of the blame. I understand he’s young, but he doesn’t need to simply allow his HC to treat him so poorly, withing taking a stand. Unfortunately, I think it’s at the point now where self doubt has been allowed to set up camp in Trey Lances brain. He looks like a QB who is afraid to make even a single mistake, for fear of the dire consequences. And now that he wasn’t allowed to be named team captain, even though he got the 7th most votes according to Kyle, and the 49ers did in fact carry 7 team captains over the last two seasons, only reniforces my bad feeling about where this thing is ultimately heading. But the kicker for me is that Trey has been forced to play alongside an experienced QB who has been named team captain thru FOUR straight seasons, and has a strong history of winning with this same group of players.
As Rob Guerrera (host of Niners Nation Podcast) wrote this morning:
“If the title of captain does have meaning, what have they not seen from him that they want to see? The 49ers are choosing violence, again and again, when it comes to Trey Lance. They could have shown faith in him by clearing the deck before free agency, getting Jimmy Garoppolo out of town, and adding more depth at offensive line and safety. They didn’t. They could have shown faith in him during training camp by getting Jimmy Garoppolo off the team then. They didn’t. Instead, they restructured Garoppolo’s deal and continued to feed the narrative that they aren’t all-in on Trey”.
Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch know how this looks. “We all know how it’ll go,” Shanahan said yesterday, “The fact that he has this successful quarterback behind him, that’s obvious how that narrative will be and understandably so.”
“The fact that they have continued to choose to walk the hard road with Trey over the easy road tells you something. They’re doing it because they think they have to. They’re willing to suffer the slings and arrows because, in their mind it’s better than the alternative. You don’t pack a parachute unless you think there’s a chance you might have to jump out of the plane, and that’s true no matter how much some fans want to hide under the covers and pretend the monster can’t see them.”
Bingo!
My prediction: Young Trey Lance is going to fold under this immense pressure, especially playing behind what I predict to be a well below average offensive line. The veterans will begin to lobby for a change at QB, despite extremely poor QB play from Jimmy in 2021, and there will be no late-season rallying if they fall behind in the NFC West, because there is no cure for broken team chemistry, and a divided locker room.
When the front office announced that “Trey was ready,” at first I took it at face value. But now on the heels of how Lance has handled the Garoppolo re-signing, I believe that he’s emotionally and mentally ready.
How that translates to the field, we just don’t know yet.
But we’re going to find out soon. The countdown is on.
I just think it’s kind of sad how so many Niner fans are choosing to simply gloss over the issues on the interior of the OL, not to mention just how questionable McGlinchey’s health appears to be. There is no bigger obstacle for a young QB than a below average OL! The 49ers have 3, possibly 4, first year starters on their OL! That’s unheard of in today’s NFL!
The OVER / UNDER for wins, because of the neglect on the interior of the OL, should be set at exactly 8.5, meaning .500, despite perhaps the best defensive unit in the NFL!
Book it!
Well, I guess you could say that having a HC who doesn’t seem to believe in you, might be the biggest obstacle a young QB can have, so between that, and let’s just call it an extremely questionable OL, it’s safe to say the deck is stacked against Trey Lance!
This is what kills me about Kyle:
“If you look into it that much, he was seventh in voting,” Shanahan said speaking of Lance. “I just didn’t want to put seven on there. Deebo was eight. We just wanted to go with six. They don’t allow eight to go to the coin toss, I don’t believe.”
Does Kyle really believe we are stupid, and can’t find out that the 49ers named 7 team captains over both of the last 2 seasons, or does he just not care?
SMH! Kyle’s worst trait as a HC, and a human being, IMO, is that he treats both reporters, and fans, as if we are all stupid!
Back here Reasons? What? Got kicked out of that other site again?
Niners should have worked hard to fix the well-known OL problems, especially after Mack and Tomlinson left. They did little or nothing to correct the problems. They have ignored the center position for years.
Allie,
I believe that drafting Banks in 2021 was a premeditated effort to ensure that the Oline would be sustained in the event that they lost any of their 2021 Oline starters that would seek greener fields during the off-season.
Where the 49ers (imho) failed was in not preparing for a Center. But the delay was due to Mack not announcing his retirement until after draft. But, I don’t believe that there was too much panic in the FO because the 49ers felt comfortable with Brendal and Brunskill.
We’ll just have to see how it comes together this season.
With Banks and Burford, the 49ers may be on the right track.
Oh no. Grant Cohen is predicting that the Niners will win the super bowl this year. Kiss of death.
Just so he can roundly criticize both Lynch and Shanahan when the team stumbles and fails to live up to his prediction. He knows he’ll get clicks, plenty of clicks. For Grant, it’s all clicks, all the time.
Cohen does? not Grant Cohn? Then we’re safe.
This year’s 49ers schedule has a lot of very quality teams. I’m a little worried for the team I love
Man, if we can have our own version of Allen in Trey, eventually, that will be amazing!
Rams getting manhandled by Buffalo. Josh having his way with Rams defense. Looks like we will most likely start the season one up on Rams.
All you negative nellies are making the Niners sound like the Rams. What’s that smell coming from Inglewood tonight? It’s putrid.
Rib,
Probably the rams fans sweating in the 5 billion dollar SoFi stadium.
Bills are good but wow, the Rams did look terrible. All those LA fans that were wearing some other teams jerseys to games the first part of last year are going to turn on the Rams as soon as they lose 2 in a row. Going to be fun to watch.
I like the flame thrower from Firebaugh, CA. Josh Allen is a Clydesdale horse.
Some football analyst compared Trey’ game to Allen coming out of college. Big, fast, strong arm and a quick learner.
If they were right, good times ahead for the Faithful.
A few more ugly losses for the rams like tonight’s home game will change SoFi to Sci-Fi.
One observation. A few years ago there was some debate leading up to the draft whether the 49ers should pick Tramaine Edmonds (who I wanted) or Nick Bosa.
Glad to admit that I was wrong.
I remember that. I think there was also some speculation about Quinen Williams , DT BAMA. Anyway, we made the right call with Bosa and Deebo in the 2nd.
Stafford 29-41/ 240 yards / 1 TD / 3 INT Rams fans and their blogs want Goff back. JK
In all the postgame flap I haven’t heard enough credit given to Bills’ OL. At times Allen was standing back there all alone on pass plays; no pressure. They “managed” Aaron Donald for the most part. Impressive.
Stafford was never a big-time, big-game winner before last year. He has now gone Hollywood. The glamor and glitz, if there is any, will distract him. Look for no repeat this year. Everyone is gunning for LA.
Allie,
I believe that you might be right, but I also believe that the rams are a post season team. Letting Von Miller walk could hurt them this year.
Many football analysts are predicting the Bills in the SB, and after last night’s performance they might be right.
Buffalo has talent from top to bottom on both sides of the ball.
A Bills v 49ers in the Super Bowl sounds good.
My bold prediction for this year is Drake Jackson is going to be defensive rookie of the year.
Not sure if anyone caught this. Matt Maiocco recently reported that Jimmy G was playing the part of Justin Fields in prep for Sundays game.
Am I the only one that has some qualms about this?
In what way does JG’ style mimic Fields?
Jack
TO CHANGE THE SUBJECT WITH A QUESTION:
* On a couple of occasions I’ve posted Rams QB Matthew Stafford is experiencing “bad tendinitis” in his right elbow.
He didn’t throw the ball in the off season, or OTA. And as far as I know, has not played a down in pre season!
* Stafford fell apart in the second. He finished the game with 240 passing yards on 29 of 41 completed passes. He also 3 three INT’s and could’t move the ball deep down the field. Two of those picks came in the second half.
QUESTION: In your opinion, do you believe Stafford’s right elbow is, or he has a problem with tendinitis?
Pretty darn excited about the game. I guess it is supposed to rain this weekend in Chicago. Last year versus the Bears Eli Mitchell rushed for 100+. I’ll expect the same.