The 49ers will not practice with the New Orleans Saints ahead of the two teams' NFL preseason Week 2 clash next Sunday at Levi's Stadium.
San Francisco was scheduled to travel to Southern California for joint practices with the Saints on Thursday and Friday at New Orleans' UC Irvine training site, but both teams mutually agreed on Sunday to cancel the practices.
The reason for the change of plans is due to the 49ers' injury concerns, ESPN's Nick Wagoner reported Sunday, citing a source.
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In speaking to reporters after the 49ers' 17-13 preseason loss to the Tennessee Titans on Saturday at Nissan Stadium, coach Kyle Shanahan alluded to the team's health concerns heading into the joint practices with the Saints.
"It's awesome to get a chance to scrimmage against people," Shanahan said. "We’re a little banged up. So, we’ve got to figure out how we can pull that off and stuff like that. It seems like losing Ambry [Thomas] will be tough. Hope a number of other things don’t pop up tomorrow, but last week we had 23 guys out of practice last time but we practiced. So hopefully we can get more of those guys back so we can have a decent scrimmage."
Saints coach Dennis Allen confirmed the reasons were health-related in speaking to reporters Sunday in Irvine.
San Francisco 49ers
“Kyle reached out to me yesterday, making me aware that they have some things going on in terms of having enough able bodies to have some good practices,” Allen told reporters (h/t Cam Inman of the Mercury News).
This will be the first year under Shanahan that the 49ers will not participate in joint practices with one of their preseason opponents.