Here are today’s few minor moves:
Detroit Lions
- Waived: CB AJ Parker
San Francisco 49ers
- Placed on IR: CB Jason Verrett (story)
Here are today’s few minor moves:
Detroit Lions
San Francisco 49ers
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.
Wednesday marked the final day the 49ers could keep Jason Verrett in designated-for-return limbo. As a result, the cornerback is back on San Francisco’s 53-man roster.
The 49ers activated the ninth-year vet from their reserve/PUP list, using the third of their injury activations to do so. Although Verrett is probably the NFL’s most injury-prone active player, he has been effective when available. Verrett’s 2020 season in San Francisco enticed the team to give the former first-rounder two additional one-year contracts. He is currently attached to a one-year deal worth just more than $1MM.
Verrett is in the final stages of recovering from his September 2021 ACL tear. Verrett’s activation seemed somewhat in doubt last week, when knee soreness, per the San Francisco Chronicle’s Eric Branch, held him out of multiple practices. Kyle Shanahan said the soreness was not related to a problem with Verrett’s fall 2021 surgery.
Considering Verrett’s past, the 49ers had planned to slow-play it with him this year. The former Chargers Pro Bowler has missed 88 games since coming into the league. This included a late-2010s span in which he played two games in three seasons. Verrett has suffered two ACL tears — one in each knee — and a torn Achilles since entering the NFL. But he made the Pro Bowl during a 14-game 2015 and excelled for the 49ers as a 13-game starter in 2020.
Emmanuel Moseley‘s season-ending ACL tear opens the door for Verrett to return to the 49ers’ lineup. That scenario is believed to be in play, despite the TCU product’s injury-marred career. It certainly cannot be assumed Verrett will stay healthy, but the 49ers’ defense has run into injury trouble at every position. Any boost the 31-year-old cover man can provide would be a bonus.
San Francisco also brought back Tevin Coleman, who was released Tuesday. Coleman is rejoining the 49ers on a practice squad deal. The 49ers changed their backfield situation last week, trading for Christian McCaffrey, but the team still has Elijah Mitchell on IR and has seen third-round rookie Tyrion Davis-Price miss time with an ankle injury.
The 49ers will soon get some reinforcement in their secondary. Safety Jimmie Ward and cornerback Jason Verrett returned to practice today, per Matt Barrows of The Athletic (on Twitter). ESPN’s Nick Wagoner tweeted yesterday that the duo was expected to return to practice. The team later announced that the duo has been designated to return.
Verrett suffered a torn ACL during Week 1 of the 2021 campaign. He landed on PUP to start the 2022 regular season, and he’ll now have three weeks to show he’s ready to return. The 31-year-old has only had one relatively healthy campaign in three-plus years with the 49ers, as he was limited to only one game in 2019 thanks to an ankle injury. He started 13 games for San Francisco in 2020, finishing with 60 tackles and a pair of interceptions.
Cornerbacks Charvarius Ward, Emmanuel Moseley, and slot Deommodore Lenoir played 100 percent of San Francisco’s defensive snaps on Monday. Verrett probably won’t knock any of them out of the starting lineup, but he’ll help provide some experienced depth at the position.
Ward suffered a hamstring injury during the preseason, landing him on injured reserve. The 2014 first-round pick struggled with injuries early in his career but has been pretty healthy recently, missing only six games for the 49ers between 2019 and 2021. Last year, he started a career-high 16 games and finished with 77 tackles and two interceptions.
Both Talanoa Hufanga and Tashaun Gipson have filled in nicely for the veteran safety to start the 2022 campaign. Hufanga, a 2021 fifth-round pick, would likely be knocked to a backup role with Ward back in the lineup, although he’s ranked as PFF’s second-best safety in the NFL this year (among 82 qualifying players).
Following the Chiefs’ lead, the Cardinals used a position player as their emergency kicker Sunday. Backup running back Eno Benjamin logged a kickoff for the Cardinals against the Panthers on Sunday. That arrangement, similar to the Chiefs’ usage of safety Justin Reid against the Cards in Week 1, will not persist past Week 4. With Matt Prater battling a right hip injury, the Cardinals worked out multiple kickers Monday.
Rodrigo Blankenship, Matt Ammendola — the Chiefs’ first post-Reid solution to fill in for Harrison Butker — Jose Borregales and Jonathan Garibay auditioned for the Cardinals, Aaron Wilson of ProFootballNetwork.com tweets. Blankenship, whom the Colts turned to in their first full season without Adam Vinatieri, missed much of last year with an injury and was removed from his gig after struggling in Week 1 this year. Blankenship worked out for the Jaguars last week. Ammendola lasted two games as the Chiefs’ Butker fill-in, being cut after struggling in Week 3, while Garibay was part of the Cowboys’ kicking competition. The rookie UDFA did not make it out of training camp.
Ahead of Monday’s Rams-49ers matchup, here is the latest from the NFC West:
Tuesday marked the day teams were forced to cut down from 85 to 80 players. Here are the moves teams made made to reach the new maximum. Players who land on the reserve/PUP or reserve/NFI list must miss at least the first four regular-season games.
Arizona Cardinals
Atlanta Falcons
Baltimore Ravens
Carolina Panthers
Chicago Bears
Cincinnati Bengals
Dallas Cowboys
Detroit Lions
Green Bay Packers
Houston Texans
Indianapolis Colts
Kansas City Chiefs
Las Vegas Raiders
Los Angeles Chargers
Minnesota Vikings
New England Patriots
New Orleans Saints
New York Giants
New York Jets
Philadelphia Eagles
Pittsburgh Steelers
San Francisco 49ers
Seattle Seahawks
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Tennessee Titans
Washington Commanders
AUGUST 23: The ninth-year cornerback will indeed miss at least the 49ers’ first four games this season. Verrett landed on the 49ers’ reserve/PUP list Tuesday. GM John Lynch said (via NBC Sports Bay Area’s Matt Maiocco, on Twitter) Verrett has not endured any setbacks in his recovery from an ACL tear. Given Verrett’s extensive injury history, it is unsurprising the 49ers are proceeding with caution here.
AUGUST 10: Despite having made a good case to be labeled the NFL’s most injury-prone active player, Jason Verrett has continued to receive opportunities. The 49ers have now given the former first-round pick three contracts.
Verrett, now 31, is on the team’s active/PUP list. While the ninth-year cornerback is aiming to begin the season on time, Kyle Shanahan cautioned that a past instance of hurrying back from injury proved costly. In 2019, Verrett was coming off an Achilles tear and a preseason ankle injury. He returned in Week 3 but played just four snaps. That turned out to be Verrett’s only action all season.
“If he comes back Week 1, Week 4, Week 8, the end of the year — everyone knows how talented a player he is,” Shanahan said, via The Athletic’s Matt Barrows (subscription required). “I thought the first year we had him here was similar and I thought we brought him back a hair too early.”
Last season, Verrett went down with a torn ACL in Week 1, marking another September setback. From 2017-21, the former Chargers draftee played more than one game in a season just once. Amid a torrent of 49ers injuries in 2020, Verrett stayed relatively healthy. He played 13 games and was one of the team’s top defenders, leading to one-year, $5.5MM 49ers deal in 2021. Because of Verrett’s latest injury, he signed for the league minimum this year.
The former No. 25 overall pick’s resiliency certainly cannot be questioned. Injuries have wrecked six of the eight seasons he has played. The TCU product has torn both his left and right ACLs as a pro and encountered setbacks in other seasons that led to shutdowns. The two seasons in which Verrett has logged heavy participation — 2015 and ’20 — have ended with a Pro Bowl (2015) and a top-10 Pro Football Focus grade (2020). That has kept the 49ers interested in seeing if Verrett can put it together again. Even considering the numerous chances the 5-foot-10 cover man has received, it is hard not to view 2022 as his last chance.
The 49ers are expected to use Emmanuel Moseley and free agent signing Charvarius Ward as their starting outside cornerbacks, with Darqueze Dennard leading the way to be the team’s slot corner. Verrett returning early in the season, however, would supply San Francisco with strong depth at this position. The 49ers moving him to their reserve/PUP list, mandating a four-game absence, would also make sense considering the extensive injury history in this case.
Today’s minor NFL transactions, including a handful of notable names landing on the physically unable to perform list and the non-football injury list as teams open up camp:
Arizona Cardinals
Chicago Bears
Cleveland Browns
Denver Broncos
Green Bay Packers
Indianapolis Colts
Kansas City Chiefs
Las Vegas Raiders
Los Angeles Chargers
Miami Dolphins
Minnesota Vikings
New England Patriots
New Orleans Saints
New York Giants
New York Jets
Philadelphia Eagles
Pittsburgh Steelers
San Francisco 49ers
Seattle Seahawks
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Washington Commanders
Here are some details on deals recently reached around the NFL:
For the third straight year, the 49ers are signing veteran cornerback Jason Verrett. The team also confirmed that, once again, he is inking a one-year deal.
Verrett, 30, was a first-round pick of the Chargers in 2014. He flashed potential throughout his time with the team, including a Pro Bowl 2015 campaign. That year, he posted 47 tackles, three interceptions and 12 pass deflections. Injuries have become a major issue during his NFL tenure, however, including a torn Achilles which cost him the entire 2018 season.
That led him to San Francisco on his first one-year flier. An ankle injury limited him to a single game, though. The 49ers took another chance on him one year later, and saw he much more success that time around. In 13 games, the TCU product made a career-high 60 tackles, adding a pair of interceptions along the way. That was rewarded with another one-year deal from the team, as San Francisco looked to keep as much of its secondary intact given the departure of Richard Sherman.
Unfortunately, Verrett’s third season in the Bay Area went much like the first. He suffered a torn ACL during Week 1, leaving him with, essentially, yet another lost season. As a result, this latest deal likely won’t have the $5.5MM maximum value of his last one, though it wouldn’t come as a surprise for it to once again be incentive-laden. At a minimum, he will be able to provide experience to the 49ers’ secondary as they look to make another deep playoff run.