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John Lynch hopes 49ers can help Deebo Samuel, others work smarter and stay healthy
Dec 17, 2020 at 4:13 PM
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Staying healthy has been a problem this season for the San Francisco 49ers. Honestly, it was a problem before this season, but 2020's still-growing list of injuries was more than the team could overcome. General manager John Lynch attributes that to several factors.
"I think we had a team that played very long into the season last year," Lynch told KNBR's Tom Tolbert and Mark Willard on Thursday. "We didn't have a traditional offseason. We went to camp; they forced you, because of COVID, to have 80 guys. We're doing training camp practices, but we didn't have 80. We had 72 because we had a lot of guys coming off offseason surgeries. So, we were behind the eight ball, and kind of never caught up."
While many have been lost for the season, others have missed significant time. One of those players is wide receiver
Deebo Samuel, who suffered a Jones fracture during the offseason, missed the first three games, missed three more with a hamstring strain, and will likely miss the remainder of the season after re-aggravating the injury on Sunday.
Lynch hopes the 49ers can find a way for Samuel and his other players to work differently during the upcoming offseason and stay healthy in 2021.
"I watched him work out incredibly hard this offseason," Lynch explained, "and you see it now because these guys are [posting] videos. But Deebo generates so much force with every cut that he makes. I think we've got to help him find a way to work extremely hard but work smart as well because the one thing we know about Deebo, he's got a rare ability. And that combination, when you put will — which he has, I think we all see as a game-day competitor — with skill, and he's immensely talented and driven. So, when you combine that, if you can find a way to keep him on the field, you can be tough to deal with.
"Along with Deebo, we've got to find a way to do that, and we've got to be better in that area. Some of that is luck. Some of that is circumstance. But ultimately, we've got to find a way to have our guys more available because it certainly hurt this team this year. It hurts every team. In general, the league has had more injuries this year because of the circumstances of what's gone on with our not having a traditional offseason and whatnot, but it has affected us, I think, more so than more teams."
Lynch added that the 49ers intend to determine if much of this season's injury woes can be solely attributed to the difficult circumstances of 2020 or if the team needs to make changes to assure players remain healthy.
You can listen to the entire conversation with Lynch below.
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