49ers-Patriots Injury Report: Manny Lawson Out

The 49ers have officially ruled out Manny Lawson for Sunday's game due to his hamstring injury.  We all see him pull up pretty quickly and that usually leads to a little bit of missed time.  It's unfortunate, but definitely better to be safe than sorry.  Roderick Green will certainly be active this Sunday, but with Lawson's injury, we might see Tully Banta-Cain for the first time all season.  He was running around like a mad man in the preseason but has been inactive during the regular season.  Ahmad Brooks is also out there but I'd imagine they want another outside linebacker to fill Manny's role.

Frank Gore was held out of practice yesterday in what has quickly become a weekly tradition.  Aside from the week leading up to the opener, I think Gore has been held out of Wednesday's practice every week this season as a coach's decision.  If it keeps Gore fresh I'm certainly all for it.  Of course, when he's touching the ball fewer than 20 times a game isn't he fresh enough?  I kid...sort of.

Aside from that Jonas Jennings and Shawntae Spencer are the only other guys missing practice, for obvious reasons.  Although, in yesterday's press conference Nolan mentioned Jennings' injury was meant to be a 3-4 week time table, which is fast coming to a close.  I'm really not sure how to feel about that considering his performance up to that point.  Again though, if healthy he is more talented than Barry Sims.

Patriots
On the Patriots side of the ball, the bye week allowed any bumps and bruises to heal.  They had three guys miss Wednesday practice: LB Eric Alexander, CB Lewis Sanders and #4/#5 WR Kelley Washington.  All are backups behind some pretty impressive performers (Bruschi, O'Neal and Moss) so those are not big injury issues.