The NFL announced today that the 49ers and Rams will play in Melbourne, Australia, during the 2026 season, and 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey isn’t sure that’s such a good idea.
Talking to reporters at Super Bowl festivities in San Francisco, McCaffrey questioned how it’s going to work out for the 49ers to have to travel farther than any NFL team has ever traveled for a game.
“Australia’s pretty far,” McCaffrey said. “I’d love to see how the schedule would work. Transparently, that might be a little too far. You have to find another way to do that. It’d be really cool . . . we don’t care where we play, we’ll show up and play, but Australia, what’s that flight, 20 hours or something?”
It’s not quite as far as McCaffrey thought: A direct flight from San Francisco to Melbourne takes about 16 hours, and the flight home will only be about 14 hours, thanks to the tailwind across the Pacific. It’s a long way, and even if players think it’s too long to travel, the NFL has made clear that it wants the money it’s making in international markets and is only going to keep sending teams far from home.
49ers linebacker Fred Warner tried to make it back from his Week 6 ankle injury before the end of the 49ers’ season, but ran out of time when the team lost to the Seahawks in the divisional round.
Warner’s next snaps will come with a new face calling the defense for the Niners. Robert Saleh’s one-year return to the team helped him land the head coaching job in Tennessee and the 49ers have replaced him with former Falcons head coach Raheem Morris.
During an appearance on PFT Live from the Super Bowl media center on Thursday, Warner said he’s heard Morris has an “infectious energy” and called it “exactly what we need” as they try to return to “dominance” on the defensive side of the ball. Warner said he’s also ready to embrace any tweaks that Morris might have in mind.
“We’ve run the same scheme for so long,” Warner said. “It’s always been four down lineman, cover-3 base defense. The league evolves and you have to evolve as a defense or else you’re just gonna get left behind. You do have to welcome those different changes.”
Health was a major impediment for the defense in 2025, so any changes Morris decides to implement will have a better chance of succeeding if the 49ers are able to have players like Warner and Nick Bosa in the lineup for most or all of the season.
Mac Jones wouldn’t mind following the Sam Darnold blueprint for resurrecting himself as a starting NFL quarterback after early stumbles.
Darnold spent a year as a backup with the 49ers before moving on to the Vikings and helping them to 14 wins during the 2024 season. Darnold then jumped to the Seahawks and will be back at Levi’s Stadium for the Super Bowl on Sunday.
Jones was the No. 2 quarterback for the Niners this season and wound up starting eight games while Brock Purdy was injured. Jones threw for 2,151 yards, 13 touchdowns and six interceptions while completing just under 70 percent of his passes and he said on NFL Network that he understands why Darnold credits his time with Kyle Shanahan with helping him take his game to another level. Jones also said that he thinks his play showed that he’s capable of a No. 1 job.
“Honestly, it’s a business. You know how this goes,” Jones said. “I’ve proven I can be a starter. I’ve proven I can be a starter in multiple different spots. I have 50-plus starts or whatever. I know how to do it, but it’s also a business. I understand both sides of it.”
The business part of things is that Jones remains under contract for the 2026 season and Shanahan said last month that he’d “be very surprised” if Jones was not back with the team. That level of surprise could drop with the right trade offer from another club, but it remains to be seen if that interest will materialize next month.
The 49ers and Rams will meet in Melbourne, Australia, for a regular-season game in 2026.
The NFL announced the matchup today, having previously confirmed that the Rams will be the home team for a game in Melbourne this season.
The league has not announced the date or kickoff time of the game, but it is expected to be a Sunday afternoon game for U.S. fans, meaning a Monday morning kickoff in Australia. The game is also expected to take place early in the season, likely in September or October.
The teams will meet at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, and the host committee is expecting a sellout crow of around 100,000 fans. It will be the NFL’s first regular-season game in Australia, but it won’t be the last: The league has already said there will be more games in Melbourne in the future.
Although many NFL fans dislike seeing their team give up a home game to go overseas, especially against a division rival, the NFL is making it clear that it’s sending games abroad. There will be an all-time high nine international games in 2026.
The 49ers have a perception problem when it comes to the possibility that their uptick in injuries has been caused by the proximity of the team’s practice facility to an electrical substation.
Owner Jed York addressed the situation during a Wednesday visit to the Up & Adams show.
“That’s been there since 1987,” York said, via the San Francisco Chronicle. “Jerry Rice was there. It didn’t seem to affect Jerry Rice. It seems like Jerry Rice can still play today. I don’t believe that that’s something that is a real issue. . . . I think we can debunk it.”
They need to. Quickly. Because it will potentially impact the team’s ability to attract free agents. All things equal, who would choose the 49ers over a team that doesn’t practice next to an electrical substation? That will force the 49ers to sweeten the pot in order to win a jump ball for a player when competing with another team.
“I think that’s something that would deter people away from coming here, or vice versa, if it’s not an issue, it would bring people in,” Cardinals tight end Trey McBride told the Chronicle. “But I think it’s something that needs to be looked at. . . . Obviously it’s gotten a lot more traction recently, so hopefully they will study it and get it figured out soon. . . .
“Honestly, I just know being that close to it cannot be beneficial for your body. So if anything, it’s a negative thing that they have there.”
Even if the 49ers secure an official certificate from an accredited university or other governmental agency declaring the theory to be nonsense, hooey, and/or poppycock, some will still believe it. That’s one of the basic problems of post-truth America; people believe whatever they want to believe, with facts being irrelevant annoyances.
