The San Francisco 49ers started training camp on Saturday, and it came with injury news. Not news regarding a player, though. Instead, it was about head coach Kyle Shanahan who suffered multiple injuries in a car accident recently.
Thankfully, Shanahan seems to be recovering well, although he suffered a concussion, broken nose, and broken ribs in the accident. General manager John Lynch spoke to the media on Saturday and said the expectation is Shanahan should be ready to go and able to coach the team soon enough, but they’re understandably being cautious with him.
First and foremost, it’s great to hear Shanahan should be OK. Car accidents are awful, and even though he sustained serious injuries, it obviously could have turned out much worse.
For 49ers fans, this season could not have gotten off to a more ominous start. All offseason, the chatter surrounding the team has centered on one thing: injuries.
Can the 49ers stay healthy? Are the 49ers too old? Why do the 49ers get injured so much every single season? That’s all anyone can think about, and now that football is back, the first thing we hear is that the head coach is injured.
You can’t even script it.
Many on social media pointed out how it had the same feel of when wide receiver Ricky Pearsall got shot in 2024 during training camp. These wild, freak things continue to happen to the Niners, and one cannot help but feel like the Shanahan news is a bad omen.
The sad fact is the 49ers do have arguably the most injury-prone roster in the NFL. They are one of the oldest teams in the league, in fact the oldest on the offensive side of the ball, and they are going to travel more than any other team in the NFL this season, which means they could be even more susceptible to injuries.
2025 was an awful year for San Francisco, health-wise, and yet the Niners still had a 12-5 record and won a playoff game. Maybe learning how to respond to adversity last season will help them this season if they face several injuries yet again.
One hopes Shanahan makes a full and fast recovery as soon as possible, but one cannot help but look at his car crash through the prism of the 2026 Niners and the thing that every fan is going to be worried about all season.
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