Nick Bosa Is Out Monday Night. Juice and Evans Might Not Be.

I knew it was coming. I still read it three times in the Safeway parking lot like the words were going to rearrange themselves if I stared hard enough.

Nick Bosa is out for Monday night against Washington.

That's the news. That's the whole Saturday. The Niners made it official after he didn't practice a single day this week, and I'd been telling myself all week that "didn't practice" was a precaution, that he'd been optimistic, that they'd been holding out some hope. They were. He was. It didn't matter.

Kyle said they wanted to make sure he was fully good. I get it. I do. I've watched this team rush guys back and pay for it in December, and the last thing I want is Bosa on a calf that isn't ready, in front of a national audience, chasing Washington's quarterback on a surface he trusts about as much as I trust the 880 at five o'clock.

But I'm tired.

He pulled that calf in practice before Week 3. He'd played two games back from the second ACL, two good ones, and then it grabbed him on a Thursday in Santa Clara and he hasn't been on a field since. Arizona. Denver. Seattle. Now Washington. That's four games, and I wrote back in September that I was out of patience. I didn't know then that patience was going to be the whole month.

Here's the part that keeps me from throwing my phone into the Safeway cart corral. We're five and oh without him for three of those. We beat Seattle 32 to 29 in their building with no Bosa, no Deebo by the end, and no Juice. I don't fully understand how. I've stopped asking, because asking feels like it might break it.

Juice is coming back, and I almost cried

Kyle Juszczyk sprained his knee and bruised the bone against Denver in Week 4. They said two to three weeks. I wrote a whole column about how much that hurt, because Juice is the guy nobody outside the Bay ever puts on a fantasy roster and everybody inside it knows the offense runs different when he's in the backfield.

He missed Seattle. Then he was limited Thursday. Then he went full on Friday. Then full again Saturday.

No injury tag. None. Kyle called his recovery really impressive, and for once I'm not reading between the lines, because there aren't any. He's playing. A fullback with a bone bruise beat his own timeline by a week, and I'm sitting here genuinely emotional about a lead blocker.

I don't care how that sounds.

Evans is the one I can't read

Mike Evans is questionable, and this one's harder. Ribs and the Achilles. The Achilles soreness came out of the Seattle game, and he didn't practice all week. He did conditioning work off to the side while the cameras were allowed in, which is the kind of detail I'll hold onto like a rosary until Monday afternoon.

Kyle's line was simple. "We'll know on Monday."

I hate that sentence. I also know Evans has played through this kind of week already this season, broken ribs and all, because that's who he is and that's exactly why we brought him here. So I'm hopeful. Not confident. Hopeful, the way you're hopeful when the bridge is backed up to the toll plaza and you swear it's about to open up.

And if he can't go, look at the list. Deebo's out with the hamstring. Christian Kirk is questionable with the calf after finally practicing this week, limited all three days, and Kyle said he could possibly play. Possibly. That's Brandin Cooks, Jordan Watkins and Jacob Cowing and a prayer, on a Monday night, with the whole country watching to see whether five and oh is real.

The rest of it

Marques Sigle is out with the ankle. Garret Wallow is out with the hamstring. Gracen Halton, Siran Neal, Upton Stout and Mykel Williams are all questionable. The one piece of good news on defense is that rookie James Thompson Jr. is back from the high ankle sprain, and believe me, after this month I'll take a rookie defensive tackle walking out of the training room like it's a parade.

Washington is down a back too. Jacory Croskey-Merritt is out with a groin. I'm not going to pretend that evens anything out. It doesn't. Bosa is Bosa.

Kickoff is Monday at 5:15 Pacific at Levi's. The week is on the schedule hub, who we were supposed to have is on the depth chart, the statuses live on the injury report, and everything else is on the 49ers hub.

I put the groceries in the trunk and sat there another minute. Bosa's out. Juice is back. Evans is a coin I'm not allowed to flip until Monday.

Five and oh. I keep saying it so I don't forget.

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