In the final stages of rehabbing his 2021 injury — an ACL tear — Jason Verrett has run into another major health issue. The 49ers announced the veteran cornerback suffered an Achilles tear in practice Wednesday.
This marks the latest in a long line of Verrett injuries. The former first-round pick has shown considerable talent when available. Unfortunately, he has rarely been available over the course of his nine-year career.
The 49ers used one of their eight injury activations on Verrett, moving him off the PUP list and onto their 53-man roster earlier this season. Verrett had not made his 2022 debut for the team; that was set to come soon. Verrett’s latest injury brings more availability trouble to what has been an injury-prone defense; the 49ers already lost starting cornerback Emmanuel Moseley for the season.
Verrett, 31, has signed four one-year deals with the 49ers. While the TCU alum’s body has betrayed him as a pro, San Francisco continued to view the former San Diego investment as a fit. During a 2020 season in which many 49ers suffered serious injuries, Verrett stayed largely healthy and thrived amid a lost campaign for the team. That led to a nice payday — one year, $5.5MM — in 2021, but the ACL tear shut Verrett down in Week 1 of last season.
During his career, Verrett has suffered two ACL tears and two Achilles tears. His previous Achilles setback came during the Chargers’ 2018 training camp. These maladies have led to Verrett spending the bulk of his NFL career in rehab settings. He has played more than six games in a season just twice — in 2015 and 2020. Those seasons produced a Pro Bowl (2015) and a top-15 Pro Football Focus ranking (2020). But injury absences have overshadowed those talent glimpses. By the end of this season, Verrett’s games-played to games-missed ratio will be 40-to-106.
It is somewhat remarkable Verrett has managed to stick around this long, all things considered. The Chargers picked up the former No. 25 overall pick’s fifth-year option in 2018, and the 49ers have continued to hold out hope he could play a key role. They re-signed Verrett to a league-minimum accord this offseason and were slow-playing his return. San Francisco kept Verrett on its PUP list to start the season, but after Moseley went down, the prospect of Verrett re-entering the team’s starting lineup was on the table.
Without Verrett and Moseley, the 49ers will need to continue their injury-related adjustments. They have made them at defensive tackle (Arik Armstead, Javon Kinlaw), linebacker (Azeez Al-Shaair) and at safety (Jimmie Ward). San Francisco has used Deommodore Lenoir increasingly and has dabbled with Ward, whose early-career stretch featured switches between safety and corner, back in the slot. The team also has rookie Samuel Womack and 2021 third-rounder Ambry Thomas as options behind Lenoir and Charvarius Ward.
This is his 9th year in the NFL and he’s only been available for 40 games. He’s gotta be pretty high up on the list of guys that could have been special if not for injuries.
Time to hang em up. Some people just weren’t built to handle the rigors of playing NFL football.
Potato Chip body….time to hang them up
Man, can you imagine the sheer amount of time and work this guy’s put into rehab? What a shame. Really good when he can take the field.
I know right? And these aren’t low level rehab jobs, either. Verrett is a top five corner in the league when he plays, but we almost never got to see it. His talent kept him around, though. It’s a real shame. Would Verrett try coaching afterward, I wonder? It would be good to see if he can pass on some of his knowledge to other DBs.
Until then, I can definitely say that he’s the worst case of bad injury luck that I have ever seen. It’s really just astonishing.
Good lord. That’s all I’ve got.
Isn’t Achilles “simply” a hero? Though he was deified.
Pardon me, he was a demigod….I was hoping he’d be back this week to fortify 49er the DBs. Now, just hope he can rehab to continue his career (if that’s what he chooses).
Dude needs to surgically attach a new body
Every year
They need to stop bringing him and Jimmy Ward back on these 1 year we hope so contracts and find guys that can stay healthy or at least give them a good 8-12 games a year.
Literally called it but I also called the sunrise too