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When 49ers LB Dre Greenlaw Likely will Return from Achilles Surgery

As long as Greenlaw is 100 percent healthy and ready to play for the playoffs, that's a win for the 49ers. Anything else he gives them this season is a bonus.

Grant Cohn

San Francisco 49ers linebacker Dre Greenlaw returns an interception back for a touchdown against the Detroit Lions on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Ford Field.
San Francisco 49ers linebacker Dre Greenlaw returns an interception back for a touchdown against the Detroit Lions on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Ford Field. / Kirthmon F. Dozier / USA TODAY NETWORK
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It has been fewer than four months since Dre Greenlaw ruptured his Achilles' tendon while running onto the field during the 49ers' Super Bowl loss to the Chiefs.

The 49ers expect Greenlaw to make a full recover this year and to return to the field at some point, but not at first -- that's why they signed veteran linebacker De'Vondre Campbell this offseason. He is expected to start at weakside linebacker until Greenlaw comes back. When will that be?

It seems highly unlikely that Greenlaw will be able to do any football-related activities during training camp, which starts at the end of the month. So playing in the season opener seems unrealistic. At that point, he would be just seven months removed from his injury.

The most likely outcome for Greenlaw is that the 49ers will place him on the Physically Unable to Perform list -- or the PUP list -- to start the season. The PUP list is for players who suffered injuries while playing football, and they have to miss a minimum of four games.

So theoretically, Greenlaw could return as early as Week 5 against the Arizona Cardinals. But even that would be extremely aggressive. The 49ers would be wise to go slowly with Greenlaw, because he's so important to their defense and they can't afford for him to suffer a setback or another serious injury.

As long as Greenlaw is 100 percent healthy and ready to play for the playoffs, that's a win for the 49ers. Anything else he gives them this season is a bonus.

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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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