SANTA CLARA — Jason Verrett’s season debut is on hold — until 2023, if that.
Verrett, on the verge of coming back from last season’s Week 1 knee injury, tore his left Achilles in Wednesday’s practice, the 49ers announced.
That surely will cast a pall over not just a defense needing Verrett’s veteran savvy at cornerback but an entire locker room that’s admirered Verrett’s fortitude to battle through so many previous injuries.
Instead of debuting in Sunday night’s home game against his original team, the Chargers, Verrett now faces another round of rehabilitation on a leg injury, a scene he’s painfully repeated throughout the Fairfield native’s nine-year NFL career.
Verrett has missed 85 of 105 games since his 2015 All-Pro sophomore season, when he had three interceptions and 12 passes defended for then-San Diego Chargers.
He joined the 49ers in 2019 and entered this season on his fourth one-year contract. He played 13 games in 2020, but he was limited to just one game in 2017, ’19 and ’21, and he missed all of 2020.
Drafted No. 25 overall in 2014 by the then-San Diego Chargers, Verrett has only played 40 games in his career, starting 36 of them.
In last year’s season opener, he tore his right knee’s anterior cruciate ligament in the 49ers’ win at Detroit. He was recently activated to the 53-man roster after opening the season on the physically-unable-to-perform list, and the 49ers have eased him into practices the past month, including a prescribed limited role in Wednesday’s fateful session.
Verrett tore his right Achilles in July 2018, two years after an ACL tear initially waylaid his career. He also tore a labrum in 2017.
Without Verrett coming to the rescue, the 49ers’ cornerback corps will forge ahead with projected starters Charvarius Ward and Deommodore Lenoir. That may keep Jimmie Ward at nickel back rather than his desired spot of free safety. In reserve are Sam Womack III, Ambry Thomas, Dontae Johnson and practice-squad rookie Qwuantrezz Knight.
Source: www.mercurynews.com