49ers fear rookie edge rusher Mykel Williams has a torn ACL

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) — Mykel Williams suffered a knee injury in the San Francisco 49ers’ victory at the New York Giants on Sunday and coach Kyle Shanahan is worried the rookie edge rusher’s season could be over.

Shanahan said the fear after Williams went down with four minutes left was that it’s a torn ACL.

“You never know till tomorrow,” said Shanahan, who got the chance to catch up with Williams after the Niners beat the Giants 34-24. “He’s just down. You never know, so I said: ‘Hey, hopefully it’s not the worst. But if it is, yeah, it sucks for this year, but that’s all it sucks for. You’ll be back next year, and this won’t affect you at all.’”

Williams was the 11th pick in the draft out of Georgia, selected to help their pass rush after going 6-11 last season. Nick Bosa’s season-ending torn ACL made Williams all the more important, and he had 20 tackles and a sack in his first nine pro games before getting hurt.

“I don’t know what the severity of it was, but I was definitely (ticked),” quarterback Mac Jones said. “I was sitting there just getting ready to go back in and I didn’t know who it was and I was like, ’Oh, Mykel — I hope he’s OK.’ I just prayed for him. I know he was up walking around and stuff, so hopefully he’s doing better, but I’m not sure.”

Williams getting injured at MetLife Stadium on the same field Giants receiver Malik Nabers tore the ACL in his right knee earlier in the season got Niners players talking about the condition of the much-maligned turf that players have blamed for causing injuries.

“I just adjust my cleats if I feel like it’s an issue,” Jones said. “I don’t know. It’s a football field, and we’ll play wherever we have to play: in the parking lot or on the field.”

Veteran tight end George Kittle said this was the last active NFL stadium he had not played in and wonders why more has not been done to address the turf, given its reputation.

“No NFL field should be the butt of a joke, ever,” Kittle said. “I feel like all the fields should have a level of safety to it. I just don’t get why there’s not a standard for, hey you’ve got to pick between one or two turfs. There shouldn’t be 12 different turfs and 12 different grass fields and then a couple guys have the same things.

“I just think that’s weird because most other sports it’s not like basketball players play on different hardwood — that’s all the same. Soccer players in Europe all play on really nice grass. It’s just weird to me.”

League officials have defended the surface at the Meadowlands.

“As it relates to MetLife, they had one of the lowest injury rates — not just as synthetic but across the league — last year,” executive VP of player health and safety initiatives Jeff Miller said at the annual fall owners meeting last month. “Any injury that occurs on our surfaces, regardless of what they are, are things that we want to investigate and learn from and if they can be deterred, we want to do that.

“But as far as how MetLife is playing, it’s playing really well and has for a while.”

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