With the World Cup coming soon, multiple NFL stadiums have torn up their artificial turf and installed high-quality, FIFA-compliant grass pitches. Then, after the tournament ends, the grass will be removed and replaced with artificial turf again.
49ers defensive end Nick Bosa, whose team will play five 2026 games at stadiums that perform the turf to grass back to turf transformation, was asked about the decision to switch the surfaces at those venues to grass before putting the fake stuff back in.
“Yeah, it’s a little bizarre,” Bosa said, “but what can you expect?”
That says it all. It’s all about money. It’s cheaper to have turf for NFL games. And it’s expensive, but necessary, to install grass in order to make the extra money that comes from hosting World Cup games.
The 49ers will play this year at Seattle (Week 5), at Atlanta (Week 7), at Dallas (Week 10), at the Giants (Week 13), and at the Chargers (Week 15). All five stadiums will have grass for the summer before returning to artificial turf.
In 2020, Bosa suffered a torn ACL on artificial turf at MetLife Stadium. (He tore the ACL in the other knee on grass in 2025.) And while the fact that he has torn an ACL on each surface will prompt some to say there’s no difference, the difference between playing on grass and fake grass is obvious to anyone who does it — which is why 92 percent of players prefer grass.
The 49ers ended up with not one but two international games in 2026 — one in Australia and one in Mexico. Even though the trip to Melbourne will be much longer than the trip to Mexico City, the Mexico trip will likely keep them away from home even longer than the season-opener down under.
“We haven’t finalized it yet, but we’d love to stay here and go there,” Shanahan said of the travel plans for the Week 11 game against the Vikings in Mexico City. “It’s a shorter flight, but that’s not really the issue. The main thing with Mexico City is it’s 2,000 [feet] higher than Denver. And so, we like to get adjusted to that altitude. So, we’ll probably go to Colorado Springs again like we did last time to get ready for that altitude and then probably go to Mexico City the night before.”
The 49ers play their Week 10 game at Dallas. Shanahan was asked whether the team would go straight to Colorado from Texas.
“We haven’t decided that yet, but most likely,” Shanahan said. “We’ll probably end up, the Mexico City trip will probably be a longer one than the Australia one, just because of that.”
The two international trips impose a significant burden on the 49ers. And it potentially creates a competitive disadvantage. Those issues, however, have taken a back seat to the league’s efforts to globalize the game.
The NFL wants to secure the ability to play 16 international games per year, with the idea of having every team make one international trip per season. That would be the fairest way to handle it. If every team has to leave the country once, the disadvantage levels out.
For now, with a maximum of 10 international games, it would be far more fair for no team to be expected to travel to another country for a game more than once per year. In the ultra-difficult NFC West, having the 49ers make two separate trips to play in another country won’t make it an easier to successfully compete with the Seahawks and the Rams.
49ers edge rusher Nick Bosa tore the ACL in his right knee in a Sept. 21 win over the Cardinals.
He isn’t fully participating in the team’s organized team activities this week, but Bosa said it’s realistic to expect his return at the start of training camp or soon after.
“I’m pretty far along,” Bosa said, via Nick Wagoner of ESPN. "[I’m] out on the field doing a lot of stuff, trying to just take it slow because I tend to push things quicker. I got injured pretty early last year, so there’s plenty of time for me to really kind of lay the groundwork to be ready for a long season. It’s going really well, and I plan on being ready.”
Bosa has done his rehab and recovery in Santa Clara, and he’s doing some work on the side this week as his teammates go through OTAs.
Bosa tore his right ACL as a high school senior and his left ACL in Week 2 of the 2020 season.
“When I did it in ’20, it was just like balls to the wall, get back, push every milestone as hard as you possibly can and I probably dealt with some stuff that I didn’t need to deal with in terms of just kind of the bumps in the road of recovery,” Bosa said. “Now, I’m taking it slow and I kind of have references to go back and look at.”
Defensive lineman Mykel Williams, the 49ers’ first-round pick in 2025, is working his way back from a torn right ACL, and defensive end Keion White is recovering from a gunshot wound to his ankle.
“They’re coming along,” Shanahan said. “They’re all in there rehabbing with a number of other guys. A couple of those guys will have chance of training camp. We’ll see with Mykel as he goes.”
49ers running back Christian McCaffrey soon will turn 30. That raises questions about managing his workload moving forward.
The topic came up during a Thursday press conference.
“I’ve been dealing with those questions for nine years,” McCaffrey told reporters, via Nick Wagoner of ESPN. “I think the workload in our sport is really monitored in practice, not in games. We play 17 regular-season games a year and everybody’s livelihoods are on the line. I would say on Sunday you’ve got to do whatever it takes to win and that’s not a coach’s job.”
McCaffrey summed it up like this: “You don’t tell the 3-point shooter you only get six 3s today.”
For him, workload management happens in the days between the games.
“So much of it is rhythmic and it’s my job to put my body in the best position I can to go out there and play and I think everything else can be monitored during the week or with a practice schedule or certain ways you train, whatever it may be,” McCaffrey said. “But when it comes to game days, I like to think you prepare yourself for playing every snap.”
After an Achilles injury followed by a knee injury limited McCaffrey to four games in 2024, he started every game in 2025. He also had a shot at his second career season of 1,000 rushing yards and 1,000 receiving yards. (He’s one of only three players to have ever done it once.)
And while the clock is ticking for McCaffrey (and for all of us), McCaffrey has shown that he is built to take a licking. Which is the nature of the position he plays.
Veteran edge rusher Joey Bosa is one of the top players remaining on the free agent market.
The question is: Does he want to continue his career? If he does, Bosa will have options.
His brother, 49ers edge rusher Nick Bosa, seems to have doubts about how much Joey Bosa wants to play an 11th season.
“I think he’s working on his golf game right now,” Nick Bosa said Thursday, via David Bonilla of 49erswebzone.com. “So, I don’t think he’s thinking too much about football.”
The 49ers finished with an NFL-low 20 sacks last season, with Nick Bosa tearing the ACL in his right knee in Week 3. Nick Bosa is back, and Kyle Shanahan addressed whether Joey Bosa might join his brother in San Francisco this season.
“I look at our team as kind of we have our team, and anyone else that we can figure out to bring, especially someone like that, that would be awesome,” Shanahan said. “But that stuff’s not always possible.”
Joey Bosa, who turns 31 in July, has not had a double-digit sack season since 2021. The five-time Pro Bowler has only 19 across the past four seasons, including five in 2025.
