SANTA CLARA, Calif. — When another long season ended on a Saturday night in Seattle, San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey trudged to a lectern and searched for the words to describe a season that felt like no other in a year that took its toll.
As McCaffrey processed his emotions and landed on the words in real time, he revealed just how difficult the previous 12 months had been.
“This was one of the hardest years of my life,” McCaffrey said. “Everything that happened to me last year … I kind of had to overcome a lot of odds.”
In a season in which 49ers stars fell from the sky with alarming frequency, it was McCaffrey who remained in the center of it all. Quarterback Brock Purdy, tight end George Kittle, defensive end Nick Bosa, receiver Brandon Aiyuk, linebacker Fred Warner and left tackle Trent Williams all missed at least one game because of injury.
Not McCaffrey. Coming off an injury-plagued 2024 in which bilateral Achilles tendinitis cost him the first eight games and a posterior cruciate ligament injury in his right knee prevented him from playing in the final five contests, he started all 19 games.
For running backs rapidly approaching 30, playing every game, let alone a return to All-Pro form is often out of reach. All of which made what McCaffrey did for the Niners in 2025 even more impressive. And necessary.
Despite entering every game as San Francisco’s primary option, McCaffrey finished second in the NFL in scrimmage yards (2,126), third in scrimmage touchdowns (17) and first in touches (413). He fell 76 receiving yards short of a second career season with at least 1,000 rushing and 1,000 receiving yards.
That production made McCaffrey, 29, a finalist for the league’s Most Valuable Player, Offensive Player of the Year and Comeback Player of the Year awards. It’s the last of those awards that McCaffrey has the best chance to win and, coincidentally, it might be the one that means the most to him.
“I think this was one of the most impressive seasons by an individual player ever,” Niners coach Kyle Shanahan said. “Just in terms of what a warrior and man he is week in, week out. … Christian finds a way every week. He commits himself 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to get his body possible to go out there and compete. I’ve never been around anything like that.”
When that nightmare 2024 season ended for McCaffrey and the Niners, who fell to 6-11 without him, he set about not only returning to full health but doing everything he can to stay that way.
What followed was an offseason of intense rehabilitation with little downtime, which took place as he and his wife, Olivia, were preparing for the mid-July arrival of their baby girl. The tedium that replaced a normal offseason training regimen was draining.
“It was more just the time and the monotony of training and rehab and doing that stuff every day for a full offseason,” McCaffrey said.
Had McCaffrey not put that work in or been able to play a full season, the Niners almost certainly wouldn’t have finished 12-5, come within one win of claiming the NFC’s top seed and won a wild-card round game on the road against the Philadelphia Eagles.
This season offered further evidence that in the Niners’ mix of superstars, it’s McCaffrey who might be the most indispensable.
Since McCaffrey arrived in 2022, the 49ers are 40-16 in the regular season and playoffs while averaging 26.3 points per game when he’s in the lineup. They are 5-9 while scoring 24.9 points per game in those he isn’t.
Even as McCaffrey’s rushing production tumbled — his 3.9 yards per carry were his lowest as a Niner and worst since 2020, as was his 5.1 yards per touch — he still found ways to produce. His 102 receptions were sixth among all players and first among running backs, and his 924 receiving yards also topped his position.
And though McCaffrey appeared on the injury report for calf and back issues as well as an illness, he was only so much as listed as questionable for a game just once, in Week 1. It helped that the Niners gave him the first practice of the week off as part of his load management plan.
“The guy is a workhorse,” right tackle Colton McKivitz said. “He just does that much more to keep his body in shape, puts a lot of money to it, obviously time, but it’s something everyone can learn from. A guy at his age with his workload and catching and running, he is kind of one of one.”
The question for McCaffrey and the Niners will be what he can do for an encore. In the past 20 years, only eight other players have had 400-plus touches in a season. Kansas City running back Larry Johnson had 457 in 2006, posting 2,199 scrimmage yards. The next season, he played only eight games because of a foot injury.
When the 2026 season starts, McCaffrey will have turned 30 in June and will be the first player on that list attempting to follow up a season with 400-plus touches for a second time.
It will be the third time McCaffrey aims to build on a season with 2,000 or more scrimmage yards. In the seasons after the previous two (2020 and 2024), he played in a combined seven games.
The 49ers can do their part to help ease the workload with in-house options such as Jordan James and Isaac Guerendo under contract. Veteran backup Brian Robinson Jr. is slated to be an unrestricted free agent, and the Niners have drafted five running backs in the past five years, which means it wouldn’t be a surprise if they added to that room again.
For his part, McCaffrey says he feels “really good” as he embarks on another offseason. This time, it will be geared toward training for football rather than recovering from injury. He also doesn’t mind the idea of adding more talent at running back so long as it helps the Niners win.
None of it will change his approach or desire to continue pouring everything he has into once again defying the odds.
“You’ve got to be ready to play in the games as much as possible,” McCaffrey said. “I’ll do whatever it takes for this team. … But I love playing football. I love when the ball is in my hands, love competing. I’ll always be that way.”
