Wide receiver Van Jefferson did not make the cut to the 53-man roster in Washington, but he’s rejoining the Commanders ahead of their season opener. According to multiple reports, Jefferson will sign with the team’s practice squad. Jefferson initially signed with the team in March and was let go at the end of August. Jefferson had 29 catches for 350 yards and a touchdown while with the Titans last season. He opened his career with the Rams and spent three-plus seasons with the team before a midseason trade to the Falcons in 2023. He played for the Steelers in 2024. Terry McLaurin, Stefon Diggs, third-round pick Antonio Williams, Dyami Brown, Luke McCaffrey, Treylon Burks, and Jaylin Lane are the wideouts on the active roster for the Commanders
The 49ers have a stable group of veteran leaders, and as a result they’re a rare NFL team that will have all the same captains two years in a row. 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan confirmed that the players elected the same eight team captains that they elected for the 2025 season: defensive lineman Nick Bosa, fullback Kyle Juszczyk, tight end George Kittle, defensive back Deommodore Lenoir, running back Christian McCaffrey, quarterback Brock Purdy, linebacker Fred Warner and offensive tackle Trent Williams. Williams has a distinct honor in NFL history: He is a 49ers captain for the seventh time, and he was previously a team captain in Washington for seven seasons. The NFL doesn’t keep official records of team captaincies, but Williams is believed to be the only player in NFL history who has been a team captain for at least seven seasons on two different teams. Kittle has now been a 49ers team captain for nine seasons, with his teammates choosing him every year but his rookie year. Warner is in his seventh season as a 49ers captain. Kittle, Warner and Williams will all wear the gold “C” on their jerseys that denote they’ve been captains for at least five seasons. Purdy and Bosa are both captains for the fourth time. Juszczyk is a 49ers captain for the third time, and so is McCaffrey, who was previously a Panthers captain for four seasons. This is Lenoir’s second season as captain
A third-round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft, San Francisco 49ers rookie running back Kaelon Black entered training camp in competition with fellow 49ers back Jordan James for the team's RB2 role behind Christian McCaffrey. However, James battled some injury issues throughout the summer, and recent reporting out of San Francisco indicates that Black currently has a hold on the backup running back job. As long as McCaffrey remains healthy, Black is unlikely to play a fantasy-relevant role in 2026. Still, McCaffrey is now 30 years old and logged an NFL-high 413 touches in 2025. The superstar back also has a history of suffering season-altering injuries, as he's played seven games or fewer in three of his nine NFL campaigns. If he is indeed the clear RB2 in San Francisco, Black carries high-end handcuff appeal into 2026
The San Francisco 49ers have released their first official depth chart of the season. While there may not be any major surprises, there are some changes to note
Until 2024, trying to predict NFL Comeback Player of the Year was a total crapshoot because there really were no criteria for those Associated Press voters. But starting with that '24 season, the criteria was changed to give the award to a player who returned from "illness, physical injury, or other circumstances that led him to miss playing time the previous season." So, long story short, it could no longer go to a guy who was just terrible one year (if healthy) and good the next. I took a look Monday at updated NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year betting trends from BetMGM and today will do the same for Comeback Player of the Year with the season kicking off one week from tonight. Much like for NFL MVP, CPOY has become a quarterback award, with a signal-caller having won seven straight seasons until that run ended in 2025 with 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey taking it home. Sign up to wager on NFL using the BetMGM bonus code CBSSPORTS to get up to $1,500 in bonus bets: Fans can stay up to date with information from our NFL news page, and bettors should also look for picks from the SportsLine Projection Model and our experts during the 2026 NFL season. McCaffrey was the first tailback winner since the Cardinals ' Garrison Hearst in 2001. Hard to argue against McCaffrey, though. He was limited to just four games in 2024 but played all 17 last year and totaled better than 2,100 yards from scrimmage and 17 TDs. Lions pass rusher Aidan Hutchinson was second in the 2025 voting and Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott third. Two players have won this award twice in quarterbacks Chad Pennington and Joe Burrow , but needless to say McCaffrey won't be winning again this year. He isn't even a betting option at BetMGM. Nor should he be. But San Francisco has three Pro Bowl-caliber players returning from major 2025 injuries who are close to the top of the board in pass-rusher Nick Bosa (+2000), linebacker Fred Warner (+3000) and tight end George Kittle (+3000). Running backs have never won this in back-to-back years and the one with the shortest odds is the Giants ' back-flipping Cam Skattebo at +3500. A defensive player hasn't won since Chiefs safety Eric Berry in 2015, and newly unretired Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald is a +800 fourth-favorite. Considering the future Hall of Famer hasn't played since 2023, he'd be my choice as it would be a story right out of Hollywood. Wager on the NFL with the latest FanDuel promo code and get up to $350 in bonus bets: But the favorites are three quarterbacks: Kansas City's Patrick Mahomes (+185), Washington's Jayden Daniels (+400) and Minnesota's Kyler Murray (+550). The book is quite exposed on Mahomes, as he leads in handle (46.2%) and tickets sold (18.1%) on this prop. Comeback Player of the Year is about the only thing Mahomes hasn't won yet in the NFL, but he "somewhat" qualifies coming off a torn ACL and LCL that limited him to 14 games last year. He will be ready for the season opener vs. Denver. Since he was cleared in late July to participate in all football activities, Mahomes has not missed any practices but didn't play in the preseason. If you were wondering, Tom Brady won Comeback Player of the Year in 2009 after suffering a major knee injury of his own in the 2008 opener and missing the rest of that season. So the obvious GOAT parallels are there, but Brady missed basically a full campaign , while Mahomes missed three games. Berry has been Kansas City's only winner since this award returned in 1998. Murray is second in tickets (12.0%) and handle (9.7%) at BetMGM, and he has the double-whammy of coming back from injury and starting over with a new team, as Murray has won the Vikings ' starting job over former first round pick J.J. McCarthy . Murray probably has more offensive talent around him than Mahomes does. Bet futures and more NFL picks at DraftKings, where new users get $200 in bonus bets after they spend $5+: The player the book is most exposed on is another ve
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Last NFL football season presented some insane moments that would have even seemed outlandish before Week 1. Sam Darnold won a Super Bowl . The Patriots made the Super Bowl a year after a 4-13 season. Philip Rivers returned to the NFL after four years in retirement. The list goes on and on. And it will happen again this season. Clearly, nothing is out of bounds. Ben Johnson proved that recently. He wants the Bears to break the NFL record for points per game in a season while winning the Super Bowl. With that in mind, here's a bold prediction for every team from record-breaking years to worst-to-firsts, coach firings, shocking benchings, 0-17 seasons and more. Prediction: Rashid Shaheed will have 1,000 receiving yards The Seahawks are going to work Rashid Shaheed into the offense to the tune of a 1,000-yard receiving season. The gamebreaker became the fifth player in NFL history with 800+ scrimmage yards and at least three return touchdowns in a season last year (including playoffs), along with Gale Sayers, Troy Brown , Reggie Bush and Tyreek Hill. Now he's going to break out after an entire offseason to get acclimated to the Seahawks playbook. Prediction: No. 1 scoring offense and No. 1 scoring defense The Rams will become the third team since 1970 to have the NFL's No. 1 scoring offense and defense (the 1972 Dolphins and 1996 Packers ). The Rams defense was terrible down the stretch last year (25th in defensive EPA in their last nine games) so they added Myles Garrett , Trent McDuffie and Jaylen Watson . They will be the top unit in the NFL this year, thanks to those additions and now Aaron Donald's comeback. Prediction: Healthy core after substation theory debunked The viral substation conspiracy theory has been debunked, but the 49ers have still had a lot of banged-up players in training camp. Still, they will do a 180 and their entire star core will finish the season healthy. Brock Purdy , Christian McCaffrey , Mike Evans , Trent Williams , George Kittle , Nick Bosa and Fred Warner will defy logic and all be a force heading into the postseason. That would be pretty crazy considering the 49ers six highest-paid players combined to miss more games (64) than they played (50) last season. They missed 25 more games than any other playoff team's six highest-paid players. Prediction: Trey McBride will lead the NFL in catches Trey McBride set the single-season TE record with 126 catches last season as the Cardinals led the NFL in pass attempts and had ample garbage time to pad stats. He finished second in the NFL in receptions behind Puka Nacua (129). So what will he do for an encore? He will be the first TE to lead the NFL in receptions since Tony Gonzalez in 2004. Prediction: Bryce Young gets benched Bryce Young has slowly taken steps forward in the Panthers offense, capped by going worst to first in the abysmal NFC South last season. Perhaps the improvements have been exaggerated, though. He was 28th in the NFL in EPA per dropback last season and he will be benched in 2026 when he is unable to take Carolina to the next level. Patience will run thin, especially after the team made two big signings on defense in free agency ( Devin Lloyd and Jaelan Phillips ). The team picked up his fifth-year option this offseason, but the Panthers' brash owner David Tepper won't put up with a step backward from Young. Prediction: Rueben Bain Jr . will break rookie sacks record Short arms (and AC sprain) be damned. First-round pick Rueben Bain Jr. will break Jevon Kearse's rookie record (14.5 sacks in 1999) with 15.0 sacks in 2026. Production over projection will win the day this year as the Miami Hurricanes standout will spit in the face of the detractors who would point to how he had the second-shortest arm length among edge rushers drafted in the first round since 2003. Prediction: Bijan Robinson will have 1,000 rush yards and 1,000 receiving yards Kevin Stefanski will lean heavily on Bijan Robinson, especially with Tyler Allgei
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San Francisco 49ers running back Kaelon Black appears to have a firm grip on the No. 2 job behind Christian McCaffrey, according to Matt Barrows. Black carried four times for 28 yards in Thursday's preseason finale against Las Vegas, including a 14-yard run, and finished the preseason with 61 yards on 12 carries. The rookie missed part of camp with an adductor injury but returned Aug. 18, five days before Jordan James came back from a rib injury. That extra time seems to have mattered. Barrows pointed to Black's decisiveness, vision and receiving ability as reasons he has separated himself. The 90th overall pick rushed for 1,039 yards and 10 touchdowns at Indiana last season and caught 55 passes across his college career. James did have 55 scrimmage yards on nine touches Thursday, so the competition is not completely dead. Still, Black looks like the favorite to open the season as McCaffrey's primary backup
