The San Francisco 49ers are back at Levi’s Stadium for the first time on Thursday, as they’ll take on the Tennessee Titans in the preseason opener, with kickoff slated for 6:00 p.m.
Following the joint practices this week, head coach Kyle Shanahan doesn’t expect many starters to take the field on Thursday, which opens up opportunity for the backups and younger players to get some more reps.
However, that unfortunately won’t apply at running back, as top backups Jordan James and Kaelon Black are both dealing with injuries that have limited them in training camp.
James, a fifth-round pick last year, seemed to be the frontrunner for the No. 2 running back role heading into training camp, but he suffered a broken rib on the first day and has been out since. Black suffered an adductor injury as well, and he’s been out the last few days.
It’s clear the 49ers are high on Black, whom they took in the third round of the 2026 NFL Draft. Head coach Kyle Shanahan had even said that Black was their No. 2 running back in the draft, and he’s gotten a lot of opportunities so far this offseason.
How are the 49ers handling the backup running back competition given the current state of injuries?
“I think it’s always challenging when you have multiple guys out of the lineup practice and reps and obviously you want to evaluate everybody out there under the same circumstances,” run game coordinator Joe Graves said earlier in camp.
“But, you know, injuries are a part of training camp. They’re a part of the season. And the guys that we have out there have been doing a great job competing, executing. And that’s really the mindset. That can happen during the year where you can, you can have a couple guys go down, and guys gotta step up. So they’re doing a good job, coaches and players, of rolling with the punches and getting, getting the most out of practice and doing everything the right way.”
Through the early part of camp, Black had been drawing positive reviews for finding and hitting the hole, which the 49ers preach at running back. And that was something the team had identified on film from Black.
“That was probably the number one thing that attracted us to him was just his mentality when he put his foot in the ground and the burst that he had,” Graves said of Black. “Really, it was just honing that in comes natural to him. Obviously, he had a couple good days there of training camp and still excited to see him out there. Just got to get him back [healthy] and continue to get better, continue to learn the offense, and hopefully we get him back out there soon.”
Last year didn’t meet San Francisco’s expectations when it came to run game execution, and that has been a clear point from the staff this offseason.
“Yeah, I think you go in the offseason, and you evaluate everything,” Graves added. “Scheme, how you’re coaching things, and all that stuff. We know that last year it wasn’t what we wanted in terms of where we ranked in the league and some of the outputs we had, but it’s no particular one thing.
“Everybody shares the blame. Everybody shares credit, however you want to look at it. It’s just this offseason has just been a focus on us and doing what we do as best we can under any circumstance, and those are the things that are going to get us through the season and get us back to where we want to be in the run game.”
Now, San Francisco has many of the same pieces in the room as last year, with Black being the primary newcomer. And the rookie believes he’s a great fit in the offense, especially considering the need for pass-catching at the position.
“[The offense] feels great for me,” Black said, via NBC Sports Bay Area’s Matt Maiocco. “I feel like it really maximizes what a running back can truly do. A lot of the time, running backs aren’t asked to catch the ball a lot out of the backfield, but here it’s the complete opposite. You’re going to go out there, you’re going to run these different routes, and you’re almost going to feel like a receiver first, sometimes.”
If the 49ers truly want to take McCaffrey off the field more to preserve him as they’ve been saying, they’ll need a viable pass-catching backup. While Black hadn’t shown much from that perspective at Indiana, he did show some pass-catching at James Madison through the first two years of his career.
That could be key as he tries to win the No. 2 running back role.