Loss of 49ers' Anthony Davis Only Increases Pressure on Colin Kaepernick in 2015

Did someone in San Francisco break a mirror? Perhaps leave their shoes on the counter? Walk under a ladder? How about opening an umbrella inside the team's headquarters in Santa Clara?

Because the offseason from hell just keeps rolling right along for the 49ers.

Tony Avelar/Associated Press

For the third time this offseason, the team has been hit by the surprise retirement of a player who is nowhere near the typical retirement age for a football player.

Offensive tackle Anthony Davis, 25, certainly wasn't when he floored the Niners by announcing his retirement Friday, as reported by ESPN's Adam Schefter:

"

After a few years of thought, I've decided it will be best for me to take a year or so away from the NFL. This will be a time for me to allow my Brain and Body a chance to heal. I know many won't understand my decision, that's ok.

I hope you too have the courage to live your life how you planned it when day dreaming to yourself growing up. Your Life is Your dream and you have the power to control that dream. Im simply doing what's best for my body as well as my mental health at this time in my life.

"

Davis joins inside linebackers Patrick Willis (30) and Chris Borland (24) of the 49ers in retiring suddenly this offseason. Defensive end Justin Smith also decided to hang them up, but that wasn't much of a surprise.

Davis' retirement, on the other hand? Nobody saw that coming, except maybe Davis. And as Chris Wesseling of NFL.com relayed, calling it the offseason from hell for the 49ers really isn't an understatement:

"

Davis, 25 years old, has started 71 games in five NFL seasons. With Pro Bowl guard Mike Iupati defecting to the Cardinals, the 49ers have lost both of their first-round picks from the 2010 NFL Draft.

The depleted unit up-front is far from the only concern in San Francisco.

Since the new league year started in March, the 49ers have lost Davis, rookie sensation Chris Borland and potential Hall of Famers Patrick Willis and Justin Smith to retirement. ... The 49ers also watched 2014 starters Frank Gore, Michael Crabtree, Ray McDonald, Chris Culliver and Perrish Cox sign with other teams.

If you're keeping score at home, the players leaving the organization in the transition from the highly successful Jim Harbaugh era are responsible for 20 combined Pro Bowl appearances and more than 1,000 career NFL starts.

"

Twenty Pro Bowl appearances. One thousand career starts in the National Football League. Just—ouch.

Now, just as Schefter noted, Davis insisted on his Twitter account that his retirement is more of a sabbatical:

"

I'll be back in a year or so.. I'll be 26 or 27 years old. Im taking this time to allow my Brain and Body time to heal and recoup.

— Anthony Davis (@BamDavis_) June 5, 2015"

I'm sure that knowledge makes 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick feel better. Or not.

As Wesseling wrote, the loss of Davis (and Iupati) suddenly makes a 49ers O-line—a former strength—a huge question mark.

Year	PFF Run	PFF Pass	FO Run	FO Pass
2013	2nd	10th	29th	22nd
2014	3rd	14th	10th	30th

That line was already showing some wear. Granted, there wasn't a huge drop-off in the its rankings at Pro Football Focus from 2013 to 2014, but there was a drop-off. Football Outsiders was even less kind, ranking the 49ers as the third-worst pass-blocking line in the league last year.

And that was with Davis and Iupati.

Yes, Davis wasn't the factor Iupati was last year. In seven games, Davis was PFF's 39th-ranked tackle. But he was especially effective in run blocking, where he ranked 13th. Davis' ability to set the edge on the strong side would have come in quite handy this season, with the 49ers handing the keys in the ground game to the relatively unproven Carlos Hyde.

The team does have a veteran replacement in Erik Pears, who came over in free agency from the Buffalo Bills. Pears was a 16-game starter in Western New York last year—at guard—where he ranked as the third-worst player in the NFL at the position, per PFF.

To be fair, Pears was better against the run. There, he was only the eighth-worst guard in the entire National Football League.

Those are not the sorts of numbers you want to see thrown around with Kaepernick heading into a make-or-break 2015 campaign. As Victor Contreras of the Sacramento Bee wrote recently, a breaking point could soon be coming where the Niners decide Kaepernick just won't ever be the player the team and fans think he could be:

"

Kaepernick, like every quarterback, has made mistakes on the field. He abandons the pocket too soon, he doesn’t check-off his receivers and it doesn’t take much chirping from a linebacker for him to lose his composure. But it’s his athletic presence, his ability to throw a ball a mile on a rope and to outrun an entire defense that keeps 49ers faithful on the edge of its seat.

"

Both Kaepernick and the club have taken steps to improve in 2015. As Matt Barrows of the Bee reported, the quarterback spent much of the offseason working on shortening his delivery and improving his accuracy. The team added a deep-threat wideout in Torrey Smith, who would appear to be a great fit for Kaepernick's big right arm.

The problem is, Kaepernick's arm and Smith's speed are of little use if he's running for his life all game long. Or if play action is off the table because the Niners can't run the ball.

And in neither regard did Kaepernick's situation improve Friday.

Gary Davenport is an NFL analyst at Bleacher Report and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and the Pro Football Writers of America. You can follow Gary on Twitter at @IDPSharks.