Before the NFL’s 2024-25 season had begun, the San Francisco 49ers were considered to be the most likely team to end Kansas City’s monopoly on the Vince Lombardi Trophy.
And now, a healthy chunk of the way through the regular season, it looks as if they won’t even qualify for the post-season play-offs.
The 49ers will need to win every one of their remaining games to even have a chance of getting a wild card. And they’ll need to do it without their star running back…
Running Away
In the summer, the Super Bowl odds made San Francisco a 6/1 chance to win the NFL Championship game. As of December 2, following a heavy defeat in Buffalo, they’re now available at 100/1.
It goes without saying that those who bet on American football have all but written off the chances of Kyle Shanahan’s team… especially now that Christian McCaffrey has suffered what appears to be a season-ending injury.
The 28-year-old was helped from the field during his team’s defeat to the Bills, with Shanahan later confirming that McCaffrey had damaged his posterior cruciate ligament. Depending on the severity, the running back – who finished third in MVP voting just a season ago – could miss the rest of the regular campaign.
Breaking: 49ers RB Christian McCaffrey suffered a potentially season-ending PCL injury, Kyle Shanahan announced in the team's postgame presser. pic.twitter.com/oJeUma7Zhy
— ESPN (@espn) December 2, 2024
It’s another bitter blow in a season full of them for San Francisco, whose record has gone from 5-4 to 5-7 on the back of a run of three straight defeats.
McCaffrey’s injury woes have been just part of the problem for Shanahan, who less than a year ago saw his team push the Chiefs all the way to the brink at Super Bowl LVIII.
Bad Luck Story
Of course, the head coach’s job has not been made easy by the unsettled nature of his roster this term.
Nick Bosa and Trent Williams are just two of those that have joined McCaffrey on the sidelines, while Brandon Aiyuk – having just signed a lucrative four-year contract – has got nowhere near the heights he set for himself during an electric 2023-24 campaign.
BREAKING: 49ers, WR Brandon Aiyuk agree to 4-year, $120M extension ($76M in guarantees).
— NFL (@NFL) August 29, 2024
(via @mikegarafolo + @rapsheet) pic.twitter.com/eRXnXZVab7
Others, like George Kittle and Deebo Samuel, have also struggled to live up to expectations, with the reason not immediately obvious from the outside; maybe the physical and emotional toil of their run to the Super Bowl last season has taken longer to get over than expected.
They are certainly going against the grain. Of the last 57 teams that lost in the Super Bowl, 40 went on to make the play-offs at the very least the following season. Of the 17 that didn’t, 11 didn’t even win half of their regular season games… a fate that looks likely to befall the 49ers in 2024.
At the time of writing, San Francisco had lost their last two games by margins of 25 and 28 points respectively. They’re not just defeats but landslides, in American football terms, and you wonder how one of the pre-season favourites can bounce back from here.
