{"id":260687,"date":"2025-12-28T07:58:48","date_gmt":"2025-12-28T12:58:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=260687"},"modified":"2025-12-28T07:58:48","modified_gmt":"2025-12-28T12:58:48","slug":"george-kittle-injury-update-star-tes-status-revealed-for-bears-49ers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/12\/28\/george-kittle-injury-update-star-tes-status-revealed-for-bears-49ers\/","title":{"rendered":"George Kittle Injury Update: Star TE&#8217;s Status Revealed For Bears-49ers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>San Francisco 49ers star tight end George Kittle hasn&#8217;t practiced all week while battling an ankle injury, and it appears as though he is a true game-time decision. According to <a  href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/RapSheet\/status\/2005134340649595255?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">NFL Network&#8217;s Ian Rapoport<\/a>, Kittle will &#8220;test out his ankle pregame to see if he can go.&#8221; Rapoport adds that the seven-time Pro Bowler is &#8220;intent&#8221; on testing out his ankle to see if he can play despite missing the full week of practice.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_260688\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-260688\" style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-260688\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"George Kittle Ankle Injury\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-600x400.jpg 600w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury-1200x800.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/12\/George-Kittle-Ankle-Injury.jpg 1558w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-260688\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dec 22, 2025; Indianapolis, Indiana, USA; San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle (85) carries the ball defended by Indianapolis Colts safety Nick Cross (20) and safety Cam Bynum (0) in the third quarter of the game at Lucas Oil Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>George Kittle Injury Update: 49ers TE A True Game-Time Decision<\/h2>\n<p>Even if George Kittle plays, it&#8217;s safe to assume he won&#8217;t be at full strength. While the star tight end is doing his best to power through this injury, he&#8217;s clearly not himself and might not be anything more than a decoy while on the field. While the 49ers have battled injuries all season, the team is relatively healthy now and won&#8217;t need to rely on Kittle to be the entire focus of the passing attack.<\/p>\n<p>At 11-4, the San Francisco 49ers are in the thick of the playoff race but are still battling for the top spot in the NFC West. Currently one game behind the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/12\/27\/derrick-brown-panthers-impact-pro-bowl-snub\/\" target=\"_self\">Seattle Seahawks and tied with the Los Angeles Rams<\/a>, the 49ers still have a decent shot of winning the division and could even earn the top seed in the conference. However, to do that, they&#8217;ll need to win out and get some help.<\/p>\n<p>This starts with taking care of business against the Chicago Bears. <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/11\/28\/ben-johnson-message-win-vs-eagles\/\" target=\"_self\">Ben Johnson&#8217;s squad<\/a> just clinched the NFC North following Green Bay&#8217;s loss to the Baltimore Ravens, but they&#8217;ll still fight for playoff seeding. If the 49ers are fortunate, they&#8217;ll defeat the Bears while the Carolina Panthers pull off the upset against Seattle.<\/p>\n<p><em>Main Photo: Trevor Ruszkowski &#8211; Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>San Francisco 49ers tight end George Kittle is a true game-time decision after missing the entire week of practice with an ankle injury.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2376,"featured_media":260689,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[36,6431,31],"tags":[1960,7325],"class_list":["post-260687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl-news","category-nfl-teams","category-49ers","tag-george-kittle","tag-san-francisco-49ers-news"],"modified_by":"David Latham, Managing Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2376"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260687"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":260690,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260687\/revisions\/260690"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}