SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Following Jordan Mason’s 147-yard rushing effort on Monday, San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan has praised the tailback’s hard-charging style but has truly emphasized his impressive stamina.
After all, the 49ers just emerged from a training camp in which nearly every other runner, including Christian McCaffrey, Elijah Mitchell, Isaac Guerendo and Patrick Taylor Jr., was sidelined with injuries, leaving the lion’s share of the summer workload to Mason. Then on Monday, he carried the ball 28 times, the most for a 49ers runner in the Shanahan era.
How did he emerge from such a demanding game? Is he sore, worn down, bruised?
“When I’ve seen him, he hasn’t mentioned anything. The trainers haven’t mentioned anything,” Shanahan said on Wednesday. “He ran so hard in that game and he seems good to go.”
The secret behind that staying power? Mason this week credited someone well-known for antagonizing him and his offensive teammates, Fred Warner.
The 49ers middle linebacker has a gift for riling up teammates. He’s the loudest player on the field in any practice and he’s known for singling out offensive opponents he senses are ready to take the next step in their development.
Two years ago, receiver Brandon Aiyuk got that treatment. Warner seemed to zero in on him during every training camp practice, which Aiyuk at the time admitted was “annoying” and “irritating” and which led to a full-scale brawl — complete with Warner and Aiyuk squaring off with each other — during an early August practice.
It’s also notable that Aiyuk had a fantastic summer and reached 1,000 receiving yards for the first time in his career that season.
This year, Mason got a lot of attention.
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As he explained it, he, Warner and two members of Warner’s linebacker crew — Curtis Robinson and Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles — were on roughly the same workout schedule following the conclusion of spring practices in early June and would bump into each other a lot in the locker room, weight room and practice field.
Mason said it started out with the typical chirping.
“You know how running backs and linebackers get, right?” he said. “We were always butting heads and then one day (Warner) said, ‘Oh, why don’t you just come out and work out with us?’”
Mason took the challenge, then soon found himself on his back gasping for air.
The mark of a Warner workout is that he doesn’t allow much time to recover between repetitions. Thirty seconds? Nah, Warner might cut that in half or eliminate it altogether and just move on to the next high-impact drill.
“I train in the offseason like it’s in-season,” Warner said. “I want to make sure I’m training harder than anyone else in the league, right? And it’s so easy to go out there and allow it to become monotonous and just try to check a box. And just like everything else I do, I don’t want to just check boxes. I want to be intentional and make sure I get the most out of it. So that’s why it’s a little different if you’re out there with me rather than if you’re out there by yourself.”
Robinson explained that the workouts are designed to mimic a practice in which there’s not much time to recover between snaps.
“In (training) camp, you’ve got to be able to go 10, 12 plays, especially if you’re a guy who’s playing in the preseason and you’re going to be doing special teams and defense or offense,” he said. “You’re not going to have time to rest. So we minimize the rest periods in our workouts.”
Do the sessions also include the vintage Warner verbal coaxing?
“Absolutely. To the tenth degree,” Warner said. “You should ask (Mason) about that, too.”
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Warner laughed when told that Mason said the workouts left him on his back and struggling to get air back into his lungs. But he wouldn’t expand on how the linebackers tortured their teammate over the spring and summer. Instead, he said he’s impressed with how Mason took on the challenge.
“Look, I joke about it all the time,” he said. “And I joke about it with him — how I was pushing him all offseason. But at the end of the day this was all Jordan. The player has to put in the work, has to have the mindset. He’s been running like that for forever, ever since he’s gotten here. It’s just now he’s got an opportunity. And he’s prepared for that opportunity. It’s all him.”
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(Top photo of Jordan Mason: Brooke Sutton / Getty Images)
