The San Francisco 49ers managed to escape their divisional round playoff matchup against the Packers Saturday night with a win despite Deebo Samuel missing most of the game with a left shoulder injury he suffered in the first quarter.
But the 49ers will need Samuel if they want to win Super Bowl 2024, and his status is currently murky for next week’s NFC Championship game in Santa Clara against the winner of Sunday’s Lions-Buccaneers game.
The star wide receiver is scheduled for more testing Sunday, with the team hoping he did not suffer the same hairline shoulder fracture he suffered in mid-October that caused him to miss the following two games, losses to the Vikings and Bengals.
49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan said Saturday night he didn’t yet know the severity of Samuel’s injury, but one source told ESPN they believe Samuel has a chance to play next Sunday.
Samuel, 28, caught 60 passes for 892 yards and seven touchdowns in 15 regular-season games, adding 225 yards rushing and five rushing scores.
When Samuel got hurt in Week 6 against the Browns, the Niners scored just 17 points that day in a loss to the Browns, and scored exactly 17 points in each of their following losses at Minnesota and at home against Cincinnati.
“Deebo is a fantastic football player,” 49ers tight end George Kittle said after Saturday’s game, per ESPN. “He’s amazing, especially the things that we ask him to do. When Deebo is in there and you match him with Christian (McCaffrey) and switch them around and stuff like that, it makes our offense what I think is different than any other offense in the NFL. So, am I concerned about him not playing next week? Yeah. We’re a different team without Deebo.”
Brock Purdy had mostly been stifled by the Packers with Samuel sidelined until he engineered a 12-play, 69-yard drive that was capped off by Christian McCaffrey’s go-ahead 6-yard touchdown run with 1:07 remaining in the fourth quarter.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]