Huge Injury Blow for Jerick McKinnon

San Francisco 49ers running back Jerick McKinnon has suffered a huge injury blow. Already rehabbing a strained right calf which kept him out of preseason, Jerick McKinnon went down in practice on Saturday.

Jerick McKinnon tore his right ACL while taking part in his first full practice session since the injury. He will likely miss the entire 2018 – 2019 season.

It’s devastating news for McKinnon, who signed a new contract with the 49ers in March. The four year contract was worth $30 million and he was expecting to be the main man in San Francisco’s running game.

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Now, it will be a year before he can feature in Jimmy Garoppolo’s offense. Despite the disappointment, McKinnon doesn’t believe that he was rushed back from injury.

“I don’t feel like I rushed back,” McKinnon told reporters Monday. “That was the plan … that’s what we went with. I felt good at practice. It just so happened, I made a cut and I tore my ACL. That’s all it was.”

It is a blow for the team as well as McKinnon personally. He had been looking forward to facing the Minnesota Vikings, his former team, in the NFL season opener.

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“I was more devastated when it happened, just the feeling knowing that it wouldn’t be all right for Week 1,” McKinnon said.

“This game probably meant a lot to me [than] maybe anybody else, just going against my former team and stuff like that. So, when it happened and I felt it, I would probably say that initial thought of like ‘Dang, I’m not going to have a week to get my knee right’ was probably the worst feeling.

“You can’t sit here and be down about it the whole time or feel sorry for myself because that’s not going to do nothing but just set me back even more,” McKinnon said. “I’m here to root these guys on, make sure they stay straight and we all hit our team’s goals that we’ve been talking about since I got here.”