Now that the COVID-19 opt-out date has come and gone, it’s high time to toss out another final 53 man roster prediction for the 49ers.
On Aug. 6, the deadline for players to opt-out due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic passed for the San Francisco 49ers and the rest of the NFL. And while it is still possible for a player to end his season if “a close family member gets seriously sick with COVID or if they themselves are newly diagnosed with a high-risk condition,” for now, NFL rosters are set.
For the Niners in particular, that meant getting down to the newly minted 80-man roster prior to veterans reporting for training camp, a cap the organization met with the release of several players in late July.
With the current crop of players currently working on strength and conditioning in the ramp-up toward something resembling organized team activities, training camp is going to look much different than it has in recent years.
But that isn’t going to stop us from attempting to predict which players will make the 49ers’ 53-man roster before the start of the 2020 regular season.
In many ways, this isn’t a terribly complicated exercise, but the 49ers, last season’s NFC champions, are locked in at various positions, both in terms of starters and depth pieces. That doesn’t mean there won’t be intriguing camp battles, just that they may be fewer and farther between than in years past.
With that said, this prediction works in tandem with an earlier one focusing on the 16-man practice squad for 2020, so if you’re wondering what happened to several players, check that out to see how certain guys may fit into the 49ers’ 2020 plans.