Dee Ford Out Indefinitely with Back Injury

Guess what? More terrible news for the 49ers.

Grant Cohn | Sep 22, 2020

Guess what?

More terrible news for the 49ers.

First Nick Bosa tore his ACL and is out for the year. Now Dee Ford’s neck spasms, which the 49ers initially said were no big issue, really is a back problem. And it is a big issue, because Ford won’t play Sunday against the New York Giants and there’s no timetable for his return, according to the NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero.

After further evaluation, #49ers DE Dee Ford is expected to miss this week’s game against the #Giants and there’s no clear timetable for his return, sources tell me and @MikeGarafolo. The hope is Ford’s back injury settles down, but it may take some time.
— Tom Pelissero (@TomPelissero) September 22, 2020

Ford played 46 snaps in the 49ers season opener against the Arizona Cardinals -- it’s unclear exactly when he injured his back. He might have injured it during practice. But whenever a player misses multiple games with a back issue, you wonder if it could require surgery or affect the player’s career. Back issues are serious.

Since the 49ers traded a second-round pick for Ford in 2019, he has played just 370 snaps for them including their three playoff games last season. And by the end of 2021, the 49ers will have paid Ford almost $35 million. Bad trade, even though Ford is an excellent player when healthy. He just rarely is healthy. I guess there’s a reason the Kansas City Chiefs didn’t want to give him a long-term contract extension.

While Ford is out, the 49ers primary defensive ends will be Arik Arsmtead and Kerry Hyder, and their defensive tackles will be D.J. Jones and Javon Kinlaw. Suddenly, the 49ers defense is starting to resemble the 2018 version that didn’t have Ford or Bosa. It still ranked 13th in fewest yards allowed, but it gave up the fifth-most points in the NFL.

The 49ers should sign Clay Matthews while he’s still available.

Published Sep 22, 2020

GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.