The 49ers’ defensive line took its worst possible hit in the most routine setting. Alfred Collins, San Francisco’s starting defensive tackle, tore a patellar tendon in Tuesday’s practice in Australia and is out for the 2026 season.
The team announced the news September 9. Collins was the starting defensive tackle, a full-time job on a front that San Francisco depends on for pressure and run defense. Losing him in a practice, not a game, does not make it easier to replace.
There is a warning in this team’s own recent history. The Athletic noted that defensive lineman Drake Jackson tore the same tendon in 2023. Jackson never fully recovered and is currently a free agent. That is not Collins’ fate, but it is the only comparable case in this building, and it is a sobering baseline for a 26-year-old whose season now ends before Week 1.
The 49ers’ front office now has to find a defensive tackle from a market that has already been picked clean. No team plans for a September depth problem in an international city, and the replacement will not have Collins’ experience in the system. The defense will have to compensate with scheme and with the edge rushers who benefit from interior push.
What this means is straightforward: San Francisco lost a starter and there is no clean way to replace him. The team will sign or trade for a body, but that body will not be the same player who stood up to double teams all summer. Collins’ absence also carries a longer risk. A torn patellar tendon is not a sprain, and Drake Jackson’s post-2023 path proves that returning to form is never automatic.
Collins is done for 2026. The 49ers are left to patch the middle and hope that the next man up holds. The real battle for Collins starts now, in rehab, with his 2027 season on the line.