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49ers GM John Lynch confident Ricky Pearsall will play this season after shooting: ‘He’s doing remarkably well’

Rookie WR will miss at least the first 4 games of season while he recovers from chest wound

ryan young
Staff writer
·3 min read
15

Just days after he was shot during an alleged attempted robbery, San Francisco 49ers rookie Ricky Pearsall is back with the team.

And though it’s still early, Niners general manager John Lynch is confident that Pearsall will be out on the field shortly to make his debut.

Pearsall was released from the hospital on Sunday after the incident at San Francisco’s Union Square the day before, which resulted in Pearsall taking a bullet to the chest. The bullet didn’t hit any vital organs, and Pearsall is now recovering after being hospitalized. The 49ers placed him on the reserve/non-football injury list on Monday afternoon, meaning he’ll miss at least their first four games of the season.

“By the grace of God, Ricky Pearsall’s here with the team and doing really well … We just all feel incredibly blessed,” Lynch said on Tuesday, via NBC Sports.

Both Pearsall and the alleged shooter, a 17-year-old, were taken to the hospital in stable condition. The teenager is believed to have acted alone, though the incident is still under investigation.

Lynch thanked first responders on Tuesday, one of whom may have saved Pearsall's life after finding him on the scene. Sgt. Joelle Harrell said she immediately used her baseball cap to press against the exit wound in Pearsall’s back to stop the bleeding, and that Pearsall asked her at one point if he was going to die.

Pearsall eventually walked to the ambulance with assistance, and was released from the hospital a day later.

Lynch visited Pearsall in the hospital after the shooting on Saturday, and said he helped Pearsall FaceTime into a team party that night from his hospital bed.

“It was very sobering,” Lynch said. “You never love to get any call with regards to your players where they're in danger or peril, and the earliest calls that I received were extremely scary … It was a tough Saturday.”

The 49ers selected Pearsall with the No. 31 overall pick in the NFL Draft earlier this summer. He had a career-high 965 receiving yards and four touchdowns last season at Florida.

By placing him on the reserve/non-football injury list, Pearsall won’t be able to make his debut with the team until at least its game against the Arizona Cardinals on Oct 6. With other minor injuries Pearsall had sustained throughout training camp, Lynch didn’t think it was possible for Pearsall to make it back before then.

While he knows he has a ways to go before he can play, Lynch had no doubt that Pearsall could make an impact on the field at some point in 2024.

“He’s doing remarkably well,” Lynch said. “It’s kind of uncharted territory. It’s not every day that you deal with something like this … He’s so much better today than he was yesterday. Really miraculous.”