In a less than stellar piece of news, it was announced that Michael Robinson underwent arthroscopic surgery today.  The procedure was designed to repair a torn meniscus in his right knee.  The injury happened when he ran into the back of Chilo Rachal and went down.  He thought he was fine, but clearly that was not that case.  No timetable was given, but Barrows mentioned that it might be a week or two before he gets back on the field.  [EDITOR'S NOTE: MM is now stating Robinson could miss upwards of 3-5 weeks.  That would bring him back right before the start of the regular season.  We'll see what Thomas Clayton does with more preseason carries.  Maybe he squeezes onto the Week 1 roster.  We'll see.]

I tried doing my own research on this type of injury but most everything I found dealt with normal recovery times, and not times for professional athletes.  One interesting tidbit I came across mentioned that LenDale White supposedly played all of 2007 with a torn meniscus.  Although he struggled at times, the Titans back finished with 1,110 yards on the season and claims to be 100% healthy now.  Robinson is not an every down back but as a special teams standout we certainly want him at 100%.  He was not going to pass DeShaun Foster on the depth chart, but you never want a guy missing reps on the field.

In other 49ers injury news, Aubrayo Franklin passed his physical today and was taken off the PUP list.  Also, according to MM, the 49ers are hoping for Ashley Lelie to return later this week and apparently Joe Staley is making his way back tomorrow after missing time with his infected foot.

It sounds like there will be random updates on 49ers training camp throughout the day.  As I come across information I'll add it to this post.  Feel free to discuss anything about training camp or otherwise that interests you.  And if you come across interesting training camp links throw them out there.  Consider this a combined running diary (updated less frequently than the draft one) and link dump.  So go to town.

Some early PUP news.  David Baas will start the season on the physically unable to perform (PUP) list.  He can come off the list when he passes a physical.  The general info is that he'll be back at the very end of the preseason.

Aubrayo Franklin has a calf injury that looks likely to lead to PUP placement.  Again, once he passes a physical he'll come off and it should be much sooner than Baas.

Joe Staley is not practicing today due to an infected bug bite on his foot.  Not the best way to start things out.

AM Practice
Nothing wildly over the top took place in the morning but as always there is plenty to infer from the participants:

The defensive lineman in the 3-4 were Isaac Sopoaga, Ronald Fields and Ray McDonald.  The linebackers were Justin Smith, Manny Lawson, Jeff Ulbrich and Patrick Willis.  This continues the trend of Smith getting a lot of time at linebacker.  I hope McDonald gets a lot of reps with the first team defensive line once the preseason games start.

On offense, Damane Duckett filled in for the bug-bitten Joe Staley and Tony Wragge got the first team snaps at right guard.  Once again, Zak Keasey is getting the majority of the snaps at fullback, although the two tight end set has been more popular.  I'm really curious what will happen with the fullback position in general and Norris in particular in the Martz offense.  Keasey is a special teams standout so maybe the 49ers figure they can save a roster spot by keeping him over Norris.

Jonas Jennings has apparently looked really good in drills.  Of course we all know he's supremely talented.  It's the injuries and personal issues that always get in the way.  If the team could get a FULL season from Jonas Jennings the o-line would be so much better for it.

______________________
Sources
Chrissy Mauck @ 49ers Home Page

Matt Maiocco

Matt Barrows

I like to poke around the various SB Nation football sites to see what's going on in the rest of the NFL world, and more specifically, to drum up ideas for posts.  Over at Dawgs by Nature, they had a post discussing a semi-regular feature over at cbs.sportsline.com.  Pete Prisco is doing a feature ranking the different offensive and defensive units around the NFL.  While it is just as random as the next guy, I was curious to see what he had to say about the 49ers.  While he had some positive points, the rankings are not quite so positive, which shouldn't come as much of a surprise.  One drawback to his rankings is that he ranked the teams alphabetically, so it requires a little bit of work to clear things up.  Rather than consider all the teams, I'll just throw up the NFC West rankings.

Offensive Line Rankings

Rating: 30

Best player: LT Joe Staley. Weak link: C Eric Heitmann.

The skinny: They will move Staley from right tackle to the left side. He played the right side as a rookie, but is more of a left tackle. Look for rookie Chilo Rachal to start at guard, although he has worked some at right tackle. The inside people are average at best. Rookie Cody Wallace could challenge Heitmann.

The OL rankings were published on June 2 and he still has Chilo Rachal slated to potentially start at guard.  The end of the OTAs will get that whole G/T business cleared up.

NFC West
Seattle: 11
Arizona: 20
St. Louis: 28

Defensive Line Rankings

Rating: 29

Best player: RE Justin Smith. Weak link: LE Kentwan Balmer or Ron Fields.

The skinny: The 49ers paid a lot for Smith, especially since he had two sacks last season. But they like his toughness. Balmer, the team's first-round pick, should be the starter at the other end spot. Fields will try to fend him off. Nose tackle will be a battle between Aubrayo Franklin and Isaac Sopoaga, who showed well when Franklin was hurt last season. The 49ers need to get more from outside linebacker Manny Lawson, who missed most of last season with an injury. Tully Banta-Cain has quickness on the other side.

Smith has been getting a lot of work at outside linebacker, which would certainly shake this up a little bit.  This breakdown was posted today and Prisco is under the impression that Sopoaga will be the nose tackle.  And of course there's no mention at all of Ray McDonald, who I see as a sleeper off the bench.

NFC West
Seattle: 7
Arizona: 20
St. Louis: 19

Obviously these are the random rankings of somebody with "insider access."  Unfortunately there are enough oversights by Prisco to leave them wide open to questioning.  Considering how poorly the units performed at times last year, it's easy to see that carrying over to preseason rankings this year.  The offensive line has as much to prove as anybody on this team.  The defensive line may take a little time to gell, but I think there is sufficient talent to make them a very interesting unit worth paying attention to going forward.

I figured that with all the questions surrounding the draft yesterday, it was easier to roll out answers and try and at least allow for some clarity. We didn't answer a ton of questions, but there are some things we can be safe in knowing going into the season.

However, the grayer area comes when we start discussing the questions raised as a result of the draft. There are questions raised on both sides of the ball and I'll do my best to answer them for now. However, it's pretty clear the answers won't come until training camp at the very earliest.

1. What defense will this team be playing?

This draft leaves me wondering whether we'll see the 3-4, a 3-4/4-3 hybrid, a bit of the old 3-3-5, or some combination of everything.  The team did not address the supposed outside linebacker need (especially considering Larry Grant will be competing at the inside linebacker position along with special teams).  They've added Balmer to the mix and he appears like he could fit in as an end, a nose tackle, or a defensive tackle if they roll out the 4-3 on occasion.  Justin Smith can play end, but could get into that elephant role discussed previously.  I have no problem with a mix of defenses but it still leaves me curious.

2. What position will Kentwan Balmer play?

Depending on the defense used, he could be anywhere from a nose tackle to a defensive end in the 3-4 to a defensive tackle in the 4-3.  It didn't help that MM and Barrows mentioned him as both potentially filling Bryant Young's role to being the nose tackle and ESPN referred to him repeatedly as a nose tackle.  Any thoughts?  I'm not concerned because I think he could handily develop into any of those roles.  My issue with it deals more with the next question:

3. What of Ray McDonald?

McDonald has some work to do to get more playing time, but I was quite pleased with his development towards the end of last season.  Now, Isaac Sopoaga has been resigned to get time at nose tackle and defensive end.  If Kentwan Balmer plays mostly nose tackle, he'll be splitting time with Aubrayo Franklin meaning Sopoaga gets even more time at defensive end.  Justin Smith is clearly the man on one side.  Or maybe it turns into McDonald being in primarily on passing downs since he's more of a pass rush threat than Balmer.  The one plus to this is that you can mix and match bodies and keep guys fresh.  At the same time, I would imagine it would mess up the line's timing if you're constantly rotating bodies in and out.

4. How will the offensive line shuffle shake out?

While the offense might have issues, I don't see a whole lot of questions.  The primary one is how the drafting of Rachal and Wallace affects the rest of the offensive line.  Will the team try and get some versatility out of the draftees at different positions, or will they be there to only learn and compete at guard and center respectively?  Dave Baas is expected to miss a chunk of training camp, which definitely could help to speed along the development of Rachal.  I'm not expecting a big impact from Rachal right away, but it will be interesting to see how he handles the chance to compete for an immediate starting role.  As for Wallace, I'd expect him to get some playing time spelling Heitmann but I really don't expect to see him on the field much barring injury.  Let's hope that doesn't happen.  Of course maybe can shock us and win the job in training camp.

Feel free to throw out your own questions and answers.  I know there are plenty of them out there.