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Jaguars Place Arik Armstead on PUP List, 49ers Smart for Cutting Him

Now we see exactly why the 49ers released Arik Armstead this offseason.

Grant Cohn

Jacksonville Jaguars defensive tackle Arik Armstead (91) talks with defensive coordinator Ryan Nielsen during an organized team activity Tuesday, May 28, 2024 at EverBank Stadium’s Miller Electric Center in Jacksonville, Fla.
Jacksonville Jaguars defensive tackle Arik Armstead (91) talks with defensive coordinator Ryan Nielsen during an organized team activity Tuesday, May 28, 2024 at EverBank Stadium’s Miller Electric Center in Jacksonville, Fla. / Corey Perrine/Florida Times-Union / USA
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Now we see exactly why the 49ers released Arik Armstead this offseason.

The Jacksonville Jaguars just placed Armstead on the Physically Unable to Perform List. Armstead reportedly is still recovering from offseason knee surgery and could miss the beginning of the season.

"Not so much in training camp, I'm looking down in December and January, what it looks like toward the end of the season," Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson recently said of Armstead's return. "You need guys like that. I can only say so much but when you turn it over to the players and the guys that have been there, done that, it means more coming from them."

Before the 49ers released Armstead, they asked him to take a salary reduction that would pay him $6 million in 2024, which is well below his market value. After the 49ers released him, he signed a three-year, $43.5 million deal with Jacksonville. The Jaguars surely thought they got a premier defensive tackle at a discount, but his body seems to be breaking down.

When healthy, Armstead was the best run-stuffer on a 49ers defense that struggled at times to stop the rush last season. So releasing him was risky. But if he won't be healthy until December, the 49ers had to move on.

And it's beginning to seem like Armstead never will be 100 percent healthy again. In addition to his recent knee injury, he also has plantar fasciitis which never really goes away. So the 49ers look smart right now.

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Grant Cohn

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.

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