Early 49ers safety battle in training camp comes with surprising twist

There’s an interesting twist in the battle for the two starting safety spots in the San Francisco 49ers secondary.

We anticipated that both the free safety and strong safety jobs would be up for grabs. However, ESPN’s Nick Wagoner noted after Monday’s practice that there appears to only be a battle going on at one position instead of two. With only two training camp practices down there’s still plenty of time for changes at both spots, but the early rotations are intriguing.

Wagoner noted on Twitter that Ji’Ayir Brown is getting all the first-team reps at free safety and even intercepted a pass against quarterback Brock Purdy in Monday’s session. The spot next to him has seen a rotation of Malik Mustapha and Marquese Sigle.

Going into camp it looked like Sigle would have a real shot to unseat Brown who’s been the starter for 26 of 34 games the last two years. Now it appears the second-year safety out of Kansas State could be in line to unseat Mustapha, who has 22 starts in 28 career games.

Defensive coordinator Raheem Morris was asked about the starting safeties in a press conference following Monday’s practice. His answer contained a lot of words, but no insight into how the battle is playing out so far.

“Let’s be honest, the secondary practice, they’ve all looked the part,” Morris said. “They’ve all done some really good things. Obviously, there’s always going to be corrections. That’s what you need coaches for. That’s what we’re out there for. That’s the really good part. It is a lot of fun to watch guys compete at a very high level. You’re talking about Tig [Brown], you’re talking about Sig [Sigle], you’re talking about Malik, you’re talking about some of the young guys that were brought in. Ashtyn [Davis] just being brought in. There’s some young guys here that have done some really good things, like moving people in the back end. You see Siran [Neal] back there a little bit. Watching guys be able to compete at a very high level is a lot of fun.”

Pads won’t come on until the second week of camp and that’s where the rubber meets the road in a race for starting jobs. Brown getting the only early first-team free safety reps could mean the team is leaning toward him being the starting FS in Week 1. It could also mean they’re giving him every opportunity to keep the job before opening up the battle to other players on the roster. Morris’ non-answer didn’t give us any insight, so we’ll have to continue keeping an eye on how that safety rotation is going to see how the coaching staff feels that group may shake out come Week 1.

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This article originally appeared on Niners Wire: Early 49ers safety battle in training camp comes with surprising twist