Turf toe injury dooms Jaquiski Tartt’s season; Has he played his last snap with 49ers?
Jaquiski Tartt might have taken his last snap as a member of the 49ers.
The strong safety will not play again this season, head coach Kyle Shanahan said on KNBR Thursday, after Tartt sustained a bad turf toe injury in the Week 9 loss to the Green Bay Packers.
During an interview on “Tolbert, Krueger and Lund” Shanahan was going through San Francisco’s litany of injury issues, leading to the team’s starting safeties, Tartt and Jimmie Ward.
“They’ve been a little in and out, being able to get them back in there was helping, then we had that bad injury to Tartt to where he got his turf toe and nothing he could do about it and his season’s over,” Shanahan said.
Tartt is a pending free agent in the spring and has been a good player when healthy. The problem, however, is he will have missed 28 of 64 regular season games from 2017 through 2020. He’s played in just over 56 percent of those games since appearing in 15 contests in each of his first two seasons.
Tartt was a second-round draft pick of former general manager Trent Baalke in 2015. Like Ward, he survived constant turnover around him, lasting through coaching changes from Jim Tomsula to Chip Kelly and to Shanahan. He played for three different defensive coordinators over his first three seasons.
The 49ers over their final seven games will likely rely on Marcell Harris, who has been the primary backup at strong safety since getting drafted in the sixth round in 2018. San Francisco in the summer also brought in veteran Johnathan Cyprien, who reluctantly opened the season on the practice squad before appearing in the team’s last three games on special teams.
Tarvarius Moore, perhaps San Francisco’s best defensive player who isn’t a regular starter, has only played free safety and there’s been no indication the 49ers will use him at strong safety, which requires more bulk closer to the line of scrimmage. Moore, listed at 200 pounds, plays with good physicality for a free safety but would likely need to add 10 or 15 pounds of muscle to become a regular strong safety.
Defensive coordinator Robert Saleh on Thursday indicated there’s a chance Cyprien, a former second-round draft pick with 71 starts on his resume, could overtake Harris in the starting lineup.
“We’ll see as it goes,” Saleh said. “Obviously, Cyp will be up (active). He’s always part of the equation. Trying to find roles for everybody on defense and making sure that we’re putting our best 11 on the football field, is always going to be at the front of our minds. Whether Cyp has a role, T-Moore, Marcell, we just got to do a really good job of trying to find a way to get our best 11 on the field and continue to be as fast as possible. So, to answer your question, absolutely, there’s always going to get people on the field, we just got to figure it out.”
Tartt this season had 30 tackles, including one for loss, and an interception, giving him four for his career. Listed at 215 pounds, Tartt has the speed to play deep free safety that San Francisco’s other strong safeties don’t, meaning the position will be less versatile with him out.
He also has a knack for big plays. In the 2017 season opener, playing free safety, he made an acrobatic one-handed interception of Cam Newton. And in the thrilling overtime loss to the Seahawks last November, Tartt may have saved a touchdown by stripping receiver D.K. Metcalf just before the goal line.
Tartt signed a two-year extension through 2020 during the 2018 draft that was reportedly worth $15 million.
San Francisco is expected to be up against the salary cap in 2021 and Tartt would appear to be low on the team’s priority list. Standout linebacker Fred Warner will be eligible for a contract extension for the first time this offseason, while the team has no cornerbacks signed for 2021 and would like to bring back free agent left tackle Trent Williams, who is currently Pro Football Focus’ highest-graded player at the position.
Warner and Williams could both garner contracts upwards of $15 million per season, which could account for most of the team’s spending while cornerback Richard Sherman and fullback Kyle Juszczyk are also slated for free agency.
Suffice to say, the 49ers might be inclined to replace Tartt with a rookie on a cheaper contract rather than dole out more money for a player that’s struggled to stay healthy throughout his career.
This story was originally published November 12, 2020 at 4:41 PM.
