The San Francisco 49ers safety depth chart is taking a beating through the first week of training camp. Jaquiski Tartt suffered an injury on Monday, which head coach Kyle Shanahan described as “ribs-type stuff.” He is getting it looked at this afternoon.
The injury leaves the team without its top three safeties. Jimmie Ward opened training camp on the PUP list with a hamstring strain during his conditioning test, and is week-to-week, with hopes that he’ll be back for the second week of the preseason. Eric Reid suffered an ankle injury on Sunday, and is listed as day-to-day.
The safety depth chart has been wrecked with these injuries, and while the hope is all of them are good to go for the start of the season, it raises some questions about depth. Lorenzo Jerome and Chanceller James are the beneficiaries of these injuries. Jerome played first team snaps after Tartt went down, and James moved up to the second string defense. They started as third and fourth on the depth chart when camp opened.
Shanahan said the team will look at its options to fill out the depth chart while the three injured safeties are out. Adrian Colbert is a candidate to get some safety work. He has been focused on the cornerback position, but John Lynch had previously mentioned he could get some safety work as well. Depending on how long the three safeties are out, the team could also add a free agent for back-end depth.