Kyle Shanahan: ‘Unrealistic expectation’ for Christian McCaffrey to be in ‘MVP shape’

49ers running back Christian McCaffrey, the 2023 NFL Offensive Player of the Year, missed the first eight games of the season with an Achilles tendon injury. In the last three games, McCaffrey’s performance has fallen far short of his partial performances.

He has 149 rushing yards, 3.5 yards per carry, 132 receiving yards and zero touchdowns.

Is he no longer the guy he once was?

“The speculation about Christian, I think, is a little unfair to him,” coach Kyle Shanahan told reporters Wednesday. “Christian plays very well, he plays his ass off. But to think that a guy who misses an entire offseason will simply be the same on the day he returns would, in my opinion, be unfair to every player in the world. People who miss the offseason and training camp usually need a little time at the beginning of the year to get back to the way they were the year before, not to mention missing half the season on top of that. So I think Christian is doing a great job. But just to think that he’s going to come back in Week (10) even though he hasn’t been able to do anything for the last nine months or whatever, and to think that he’s just going to be in MVP shape is a very unrealistic expectation.”

Shanahan still believes McCaffrey is getting the job done despite the not-great numbers.

“I think he looks really good,” Shanahan said. “I think he’s playing very well. I don’t think he had many clean lanes. I think he had a couple against, when I say a couple, I actually mean two against Tampa, and if he hits those two, that’s maybe just a half step off just by looking at it. But hit those two and the yards per carry will completely change, which looks better from the outside but doesn’t change what’s actually happening. So sitting here and talking like he has problems, he’s not going to do that at all. But it would be unfair to any player if we were disappointed that he wasn’t quite the same as he was or that he wasn’t exactly in MVP form.”

McCaffrey’s attempt to return to his usual form, Shanahan to spread the reps among McCaffrey, Jordan Mason and Isaac Guerendo.

“We’re not just a big three-man rotation team, especially when you have a solid starter,” Shanahan said. “We’re not trying to take Christian off the field anymore. We want to keep him fresh and at his best, but Christian is also a guy who gets better with time. He’s a guy who’s a lot more comfortable out there. I don’t think these games went that way either, we generally didn’t play much with the ball at all last week. . . . I think we scored 14 runs. If that’s the case, you don’t go on long drives, instead you only have 13 or 14 plays in the entire first half, one of which lasts almost two minutes and the other lasts four minutes. It’s just not going to work like that.”

The 49ers apparently plan to continue betting on McCaffrey. And if he can return to midseason form by the end of the season, the 49ers could end up in a great position — if they can win enough games along the way to make the playoffs.