49ers plan to part ways with De’Vondre Campbell a day after he declined to play against Rams

A day after refusing to participate in San Francisco’s 12-6 loss to the Los Angeles Rams, the 49ers gave every indication that they plan to part ways with linebacker De’Vondre Campbell Sr.

When asked on a conference call Friday if he expected Campbell to be on the team in Week 16 and beyond, coach Kyle Shanahan said, “No, I don’t.” Earlier during his availability, Shanahan said the team was “working through the semantics of exactly how we’re going to handle it” and that “we’re going to handle the situation appropriately.”

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49ers’ De’Vondre Campbell refuses to play and leaves the TNF game in the third quarter

Campbell told the team he did not want to play and left the field in the third quarter of Thursday night’s game, coach Kyle Shanahan said after the game. Shanahan added that Campbell did not provide a reason for his refusal to participate in Thursday’s game and did not contact the coach to explain his decision. The Athletics Contacted Campbell’s agent on Friday but have not heard back.

The 49ers wanted Campbell to replace Dre Greenlaw, who left the game due to knee and Achilles soreness. Greenlaw played for the first time since tearing his Achilles tendon in the Super Bowl and was expected to play a limited number of snaps. Greenlaw replaced Campbell in the starting lineup after the veteran started 12 of the first 13 games.

After the game, several of Campbell’s teammates expressed their displeasure with the linebacker’s decision.

“He is a professional, he has been playing for a long time. If he didn’t want to play, he shouldn’t have stripped,” cornerback Charvarius Ward said. ‘He could have told them that before the game. So I feel like that was a sucker punch – that he did. It definitely hurt the team because Dee (Winters) went down and we needed a linebacker. And I think (Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles) was confused too, so for him to do that, in my opinion, that’s stupid stuff. He will probably be circumcised soon.”

Tight end George Kittle did not know what happened to Campbell until after the game and was upset by the move.

“Look, if you’re on the roster and you fit in well, you’re expected to play,” Kittle said. “I think anyone in this building that was asked to go in, I would say 100 percent of anyone would die to step on that football field. And so, you know, people experience random things off the field. I can’t speak about that. Whatever his decision was, it wasn’t for this organization, it wasn’t for this team. And that’s up to him. I’m not very happy with it.

“I wish I would have heard about it on the field, but I didn’t. Is that the reason we lost? Absolutely not. But it’s hard to win football games if someone doesn’t want to play football, especially if you’re eligible.”

Campbell signed with the 49ers this offseason after spending the past three seasons with the Green Bay Packers. He has racked up a total of 79 tackles in 13 games this season. The 31-year-old played for four teams (49ers, Packers, Arizona Cardinals and Atlanta Falcons) in his nine-year career and was a first-team All-Pro in 2021 with Green Bay.

How does this affect the 49ers’ depth chart at LB?

Campbell’s departure will move junior linebacker Dee Winters down the pecking order once he recovers from the neck injury that kept him out of Thursday’s game. That switch had already started on Sunday in the victory over the Chicago Bears and may have been the cause of Campbell’s irritation. Campbell started the Bears game, but Winters took over his spot during stretches in the second half. That also happened in Week 3 against the Los Angeles Rams, which caused frustration for Campbell at the time, but Winters was injured in that game and Campbell kept his starting job.

This season, the 49ers’ top two linebackers will be Fred Warner and Greenlaw, who may not be quite ready for a full slate of snaps after returning from a torn Achilles tendon, and Winters will fill in for him as needed. The 49ers could also promote a linebacker from the practice squad, Jalen Graham or DaShaun White, to take Campbell’s spot on the 53-man roster.

The bigger payoff from the Campbell incident may be an attitude. His departure Thursday drew strong reactions from his soon-to-be former teammates, many of whom played through injuries or, in Ward’s case, after personal tragedy. Kittle noted how many young players and aspiring players “would die to be on that football field.” With just three games left and a playoff berth unlikely, the 49ers said they would use the rest of the season to figure out who really wanted to be on the team. That is to say, while there was some resignation after Thursday’s loss to the Rams, Campbell’s departure also seemed to spark a lot of strife. – Matt Barrows, 49ers beat writer

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(Photo: Neville E. Guard/Imagn Images)