The 49ers are playing the waiting game with Brock Purdy as the swelling in his throwing elbow goes down. About a month has passed since he tore the UCL in the NFC Championship, but last week’s scheduled surgery was postponed due to ongoing inflammation.
For now, all eyes are on Trey Lance’s ankle/foot injury recovery, as he is on track to lead the 49ers throughout offseason team activities (OTAs) beginning in April.
49ers general manager John Lynch spoke to reporters at length about the situation Tuesday during a press conference at the NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis. According to Lynch, Purdy could be having his surgery soon with Texas Rangers team doctor Dr. Keith Meister.
“He’s done thousands of these surgeries and when you have all the swelling out, when you have all the stiffness out, is when he’s had the best success with the outcomes,” Lynch said. “And so, we’re very thankful and we’re hopeful that when they meet down in Arizona this week they can move forward and then it would be early next week as to when they would go in there and have the surgery.”
So it appears that Purdy is on track to have his surgery in early March, about six months before the Week 1 action begins on Sept. 7. Initial reports stated Purdy would face a six-month recovery, but Lynch didn’t want to commit to that timeline.
“Every person’s different, so timelines are just that, they’re guidelines, but we’ll see,” Lynch said. “The reality is the majority of these are done on baseball players. This is not a baseball injury. Even the way in which it happened, Brock’s going to throw on and a 250-pound man with an opposing force, it’s a different injury and so, the outcomes are different and we’ll see where it goes.”
Lance has been spotted at Bay Area basketball games with the Warriors and Stanford women’s basketball lately, so he’s been sticking around so far this offseason. According to Lynch, Lance has returned to the practice field and is “doing really well.”
“I feel like I tell you guys this all the time, but when I’m on my office, I got a nice view. I’m on the second floor, I got a nice view of the field,” Lynch said. “I get reports obviously, but my eyes tell me a lot and I’m watching Trey out there taking drops each day. I don’t see a limp. It’s not to say he’s a 100%, but he’s really recovering well and doing a really nice job and so, he did start the throwing here recently. Trey’s rehabbing extremely well. He did have that secondary procedure. It wasn’t really a setback. One of the plates was kind of given some interference with some of the tendons, stuff above my head, but they took care of it and he seems to be doing really well and we’re happy for him.”
It’s looking more and more like Lance will be the Week 1 starter for the 49ers if healthy.
