What’s the latest update on Christian McCaffrey’s injury? When will the 49ers running back return?

If you’ve been following the San Francisco 49ers and their running back, then you already know that his injury situation has been all over the place this season. Following the latest round of updates, it may be that the team is about to get one of its best players back.

Niners hopeful for Christian McCaffrey’s return

Earlier this week, San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey traveled to Germany to see a specialist about his problematic Achilles tendonitis. The report came on the back of a clean MRI that the team itself performed which suggested that there was a deeper issue at hand. Nonetheless, Niners head coach Kyle Shanahan provided an update on the status of the 2023 NFL Offensive Player of the Year, explaining the team’s approach to the situation before disclosing what the plan is going forward.

“I think we’ll get a better idea here over the next couple of weeks,” Shanahan said during his weekly radio appearance on KNBR on Thursday. “The whole point of putting him on IR is to guarantee that we couldn’t do anything for at least four weeks. And two weeks into it, the whole point was just to rest him for two weeks and not do that.” Continuing, Shanahan noted that the coming weeks will be critical in understanding how to proceed. “I think we’ll get a better idea here over the next couple of weeks. The whole point of putting him on IR is to guarantee that we couldn’t do anything for at least four weeks. And two weeks into it, the whole point was just to rest him for two weeks and not do that.”

With Shanahan’s comments in mind, we can assume the 49ers will kick McCaffrey’s rehab program into overdrive once his IR minimum of two weeks has passed. Indeed, the coach himself made that clear. “...And now, we’re going to start hitting the rehab harder and trying to get him back into football stuff and see how it responds,” Shanahan said. “So we’ll see how he responds here. We’ve let him rest here for a couple of weeks.” Interestingly, Shanahan also addressed the recent chatter surrounding the severity of McCaffrey’s problem with many suggesting that the idea that he traveled to Germany to see a specialist is a sign that things are worse than the team has indicated.

“Christian’s just seeing every specialist he can, doing all the little stuff that Christian does more than anybody I’ve ever been around,” Shanahan said. “He is of full-time commitment to everything for his body year-round. And so, he’s been doing that stuff while not pushing it hard in rehab. And now, we’ll probably turn it up here in the next couple of weeks. I know he still has at least two more weeks before we could have an option to play him, and we’ll start testing that out sooner than later.” Ultimately, it looks like it could be a few months before McCaffrey is on the field again, a prospect that does not bode well for the Niners.