Nick Bosa is working his way back to the San Francisco 49ers defense.
Bosa missed most of the 2025 season after tearing his ACL in Week 3. The 2022 Defensive Player of the Year hasn't practiced to begin training camp, but 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan isn't panicking.
Shanahan told reporters on Tuesday, per Bay Area News Group's Cam Inman, that Bosa is sidelined with tendinitis in his surgically repaired right knee. The team will ease Bosa back into action, but Shanahan didn't sound overly worried about the star rusher's availability for a Week 1 matchup against the Los Angeles Rams on Thursday, Sept. 10.
"Pretty normal thing with ACLs," Shanahan said. "Gotta be smart and be week to week. No concerns about it being more than that."
More on Bosa's status
Earlier this month, Bosa told The MMQB's Albert Breer that he has experienced tendinitis in his right knee since high school. The doctor who performed his ACL surgery also treated that issue.
"That's gone, so it's like an improvement," Bosa said. "So once I'm through this rehab, I feel like my right knee — because that was kind of a chronic issue that I had a little bit, and he cleaned that up in my quad tendon and that hasn't been an issue at all — could feel better when I'm done with this recovery."
Bosa also tore his right ACL in high school and missed all but two games of the 2020 season with an ACL tear in his left knee. The 28-year-old feels he's better equipped to return from last year's latest health setback.
"You learn something every time you do it, every year really, injury or not, you kind of learn how to prepare a certain way to be at your best," Bosa said. "When I came off of the one in 2020, it forced me to … I don't know how to explain it. Honestly, my legs get so big when I have years built up of training them. And it's not like I trained to bodybuild my legs. They get big. And I feel like, it's just an observation that I've made, coming off that injury in 2020, I was moving better with less mass on my legs."
Bosa made four straight Pro Bowls before the ACL tear halted his 2025 campaign. The 49ers can use him back promptly for a big Week 1 division matchup at Australia.
