San Francisco 49ers star running back Christian McCaffrey was announced as 'OUT' just before kickoff on Monday night, which was unfortunate news to many, as most everyone was expecting him to play.
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Following the season opening 32-19 win vs. the New York Jets, there was some controversy surrounding the transparency of CMC's injury status, as the backup Jordan Mason, who took over the backfield role and rushed for 147 yards and a touchdown in place of McCaffrey, was asked by the postgame interviewer when he knew that he would be starting.
“When did I find out? Maybe Friday?” - Jordan Mason on when he found out he would be starting.
I bet there’s a few bettors who wish they had that info on Friday 👀
pic.twitter.com/8TKjGjObIP— Covers (@Covers) September 10, 2024
And the answer Mason gave insinuated that he knew on Friday, which outraged sports bettors and fantasy football owners, who unlike the backup running back, were not given a heads up about McCaffrey not playing until an hour before game time.
49ers RB Jordan Mason revealed in a post game interview that he was told Friday he would start which coach Kyle Shanahan later denied. Might just be a misunderstanding, but somebody still dropped the ball by not preparing the rookie on how to handle the question. #NFL pic.twitter.com/jUdkVQZEJT
— Crisis Communications in Sports Podcast (@SportsComms_Pod) September 10, 2024
That is to say, then drama ensued during the postgame interviews as head coach Kyle Shanahan seemingly denied Mason's statement, which some believed was just a way to cover up avoiding an NFL investigation for not revealing accurate injury reports.
#49ers RB Jordan Mason said during his postgame interview on the ESPN broadcast he was told he was starting Friday night. Kyle Shanahan said that wasn’t the case and only told him he’d likely have to play a bunch: “He didn’t know for sure he was (starting) until today.”
— Mike Garafolo (@MikeGarafolo) September 10, 2024
All in all, after first being diagnosed with a calf strain, Shanahan confirmed that McCaffrey is dealing with Achilles tendinitis, which means his status fluctuates and comes and goes depending how he feels.
"My mindset every week is I'm going to play," McCaffrey said Wednesday, per ESPN. "There's been weeks where I'll go the full week, not even feeling good enough to do the walkthrough, and then I wake up and the body's capable of a lot of cool things. Mentally, I'm always prepared to play, and then woke up and it was a group decision, a very tough one. I hate not playing, but I look at it as a chess move and something that hopefully you can benefit from the rest of the season."
Coach Shanahan referenced that there is a lot of precaution that goes into handling an injury like this, especially considering that it's the beginning of the season.
"Christian is very diligent about that stuff," Shanahan told reporters. "If it was a playoff game, he made it very clear to me he believed he could go. But when you hear that type of stuff, and it's not a playoff game, and it's Week 1, especially when you're dealing with the lower extremities like that, it was a tough decision, but hearing all the words and stuff, in the long run it made it easy."
As for the next game on the schedule, the Week 2 matchup vs. the Minnesota Vikings (Sunday September 15 at 1:00 pm ET), McCaffrey has been a limited participant at practice this week, so his status is still up in the air.
Although CMC said that he is mentally preparing himself to play, according to NFL Network's Ian Rapoport, "it feels like a long shot" that McCaffrey will take the field on Sunday.
