The San Francisco 49ers picked up about $11 million in salary-cap space by restructuring the contract of defensive end Dee Ford. It became evident that the veteran defender wasn't going to be medically cleared by this week's deadline, at which point much of his salary becomes guaranteed. Ford was limited to just one game last season as he dealt with neck and back injuries.
General manager John Lynch and head coach Kyle Shanahan spoke virtually with reporters on Monday for nearly 40 minutes. During the conversation, the former provided an update on Ford's recovery without going into too much detail.
"Dee's doing well," Lynch said. "With that type of injury, you don't want to get too high or too low, and I think he's really in a good place. He's working. He's been here every day ... He's working extremely hard. It's encouraging to look out my window and see things progress. I think we'll leave it at that."
It looks like the 49ers will be holding onto Ford for at least the immediate future, and are hoping he can recover in time to contribute during the upcoming season. In January, Lynch sounded less optimistic about Ford's availability.
The contract restructure helped San Francisco retain many of its own players, which allowed team brass to decide to move up in the draft, knowing that it had some salary-cap flexibility to draft a quarterback while retaining Jimmy Garoppolo.
"[We're] very appreciative to Dee, and his representative, Adisa (Bakari), for working with us to come up with something that would allow for us to gain some more room, and he worked with us," Lynch continued. "We're extremely appreciative. I think both sides won there."
Ford has appeared in just 12 games in his two seasons with the 49ers while recording 17 tackles, six tackles for a loss, 6.5 sacks, six quarterback hits, and two forced fumbles during that time. He is scheduled to count $8.9 million against this year's cap.