49ers’ Kyle Shanahan Gives Update on the sensational ace as they proceed to the matchup
It was one thing to get battered on Monday Night Football in Week 16 of the NFL regular season, against a team that is looking more and more like a Super Bowl favorite from the AFC in recent weeks. It was quite another to get battered while undergoing a string of what could prove to be critical injuries for the 49ers.
Because, despite the focus that gets placed on stars Brock Purdy and Christian McCaffrey, the true bellwether of the 49ers offense is their left tackle, and the team simply can’t afford a Trent Williams injury that carries into the postseason.
Williams left the loss to Baltimore on Monday with a groin injury. That was made worse when backup Jaylon Moore went out with a concussion, and worse still when Williams’ partner on the left side of the line, Aaron Banks, suffered a toe injury.
A groin injury, of course, can be tricky and the severity difficult to measure.
“He tried to go back in,” Shanahan said in his postgame press conference. “The trainer didn’t think it was a good idea, so we’ll get the MRI tomorrow and see how it goes.”
Williams tried to calm the waters in the postgame locker room. “I’m good,” Williams said to several reporters, per the San Francisco Chronicle. “I know you want to ask me about the injury. I’ll be all right.”
But, again, it will take a day of rest and an MRI for Williams to truly have a sense of how bad the injury is.
Trent Williams Injury: 49ers Struggle Without Him
There should be no doubt about the severity of the situation should the 49ers be without Williams in the postseason. He has been a Pro Bowl left tackle for 10 consecutive years, a mainstay on the line for San Francisco. Despite the fact that he is 35 years old, he is still the No. 2-graded left tackle in the NFL, per Pro Football Focus’ grading system. Williams has a grade of 85.8 at PFF this year.
He was the No. 1 left tackle in the league for the past three seasons
Worse yet, we have seen how the 49ers look when the offense tries to play through a Trent Williams injury. Williams was injured in Week 6 against Cleveland, when he hurt his ankle but played through the pain. The 49ers lost that game, and scored just 17 points. He sat out Weeks 7 and 8, too, against the Vikings and Bengals, and the 49ers lost both games, again scoring 17 points in each.
Ronde Barber: ‘How About Trent Williams Getting Some MVP Love?
Pro Football Hall of Famer Ronde Barber looked at what happened to the 49ers in that loss to the Ravens and saw a team that looked a lot like the one that was on that losing streak. Speaking on The 33rd Team website, Barber said there’s some evidence that maybe Williams ought to be the one getting “MVP love.”
“We ask ourselves, how does that happen to a team that has been so proficient on offense all year long?” Barber said. “I’ll give you one guy. We talk about Brock Purdy being the MVP, we talk about Christian McCaffrey getting MVP recognition. How about Trent Williams getting some MVP love, from this side—we all know, in those three games they lost during the year, they only scored 17 points in all three of those games.
“The one constant was the Trent Williams injury, he was out of the football game. When he went out of this football game, Brock Purdy turned into the version of Brock Purdy we saw during that three-game losing streak.”
There is just no room for a Trent Williams injury, as Barber sees it, if the 49ers want to get to the Super Bowl.
“Take from that what you will but the major theme: Trent Williams needs to play for San Francisco to be as good as they can possibly be,” he added.
