The 49ers have started the season 3-0 but yesterday brought about a massive blow to their defense. Testing on Nick Bosa‘s knee revealed he suffered an ACL tear. 
As a result, San Francisco’s top pass rusher will be sidelined for the remainder of the season. Replacing Bosa’s production will be a challenge if in-house options are relied upon as replacements. An outside move could be made as well, as head coach Kyle Shanahan noted.
“There’s got to be trade options that make sense for you and another team, but you can’t just do that stuff just to do it,” Shanahan said when speaking about the possibility of acquiring a pass rusher via trade (h/t Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio).
For the most part, a by-committee approach will of course be needed to compensate for losing Bosa. First-round rookie Mykel Williams has already established himself as a key figure along the defensive front, and that will need to continue moving forward. Veterans Yetur Gross-Matos (who is in his second campaign with the 49ers) and Bryce Huff (who was acquired via trade this offseason) are in the fold, and they could see an uptick in usage now that Bosa is sidelined. Gross-Matos is a pending free agent, while Huff is on the books through 2026 (although his base salary for next season is not guaranteed).
In both cases, then, a strong showing to close out the current campaign would be key ensuring an extended stay in the Bay Area. At least one of Gross-Matos or Huff could land a full-time starting gig moving forward; the latter has recorded one sack in each of the past two games while handling a 48% snap share. Huff is not known as a strong run defender, on the other hand, something which could lend itself to an outside addition as a depth option.
The likes of Za’Darius Smith (Eagles), Jadeveon Clowney (Cowboys) and Preston Smith (Commanders) have signed with their new teams early in the season, taking them off the market. The trade route will be explored to no surprise, but the 49ers may need to wait several weeks before the list of sellers becomes more clearly defined. In any case, it will be interesting to see if a deal is pursued with Bosa out of the picture.
For the hundredth time, fire the training and med staff. Our body count every year is ridiculous
Okay because the training staff tore his ACL. Injuries are freak injuries. They aren’t soft tissue injuries.
For the hundredth time. They have changed their training staff several times. Injuries just happen. Every team around the league is dealing with a bunch of injuries. Plus no amount of training and stretching is going to help 2 grown men pushing into you while your legs are fully stretched out sideways.
SD_SF_DET, try 101. 101 will be just as ignorant as the first 100.
Is Aldon Smith available? 🙂
Smith said he was done with football in 2023, but there’s another guy that’s around Smith’s age who actually still wants to play: Jason Pierre-Paul. Lynch might want to keep his agent’s phone number just in case if he can’t make a deal for anyone.
all the veteran pass rushers just signed… too late.
Call the Bengals about Trey Hendrickson. Their season is toast.
Offer them 2 4th rnd picks and see if they bite
Oh yeah, that’ll do it.
Well, Gross-Matos is okay, not bad but not a world beater. Huff is a fantastic pass rusher who does not offer good run defense. Williams obviously will be relied upon to hold the opposite side. The platoon of rushers will fill in collectively, and I expect them to good on pass rush downs specifically because Huff can offer good production in those particular situations. Bosa is quite obviously the best player on that line, and teams planning on dealing with him gave the other players more opportunities, so that will be the big thing to watch-can they keep up their current play, whatever it may be, with stronger protections against them?
Of those former options mentioned, P. Smith really isn’t an upgrade over the rotation provided. Z. Smith is a good player who’s best in a rotation at this point in his career, and Clowney is basically an anti-Bryce Huff who offers great run defense and an average pass rush. If the 9ers want an upgrade over what they have, they’ll have to do a trade. The question then becomes this-if they do a trade, would it be for a permanent option , or a fill-in? If it’s a fill-in, it’ll be hard to get someone worth it for the price that San Fran would be willing to pay. If it’s permanent, it’ll couldn’t be something to relegate that new player or their new pick in Williams to a secondary role when Bosa comes back. I think that they’ll roll with their current setup for at least a couple of games to see how it goes, first.
San Fran isn’t going to win anything this year, thus there is no sense in tossing away picks just to lose on wildcard weekend.