Kittle had been listed as ‘questionable’ due to a sprained foot, while Samuel has dealt with a wrist injury and an illness that led to a bout of pneumonia last week. The former South Carolina star returned to practice on Thursday.
The 31-year-old tight end has 34 touchdowns this season on 42 targets, leading to five touchdowns. Samuel, meanwhile, has 20 catches on 32 targets for one touchdown and 335 yards.
Depth at receiver has been crucial for San Francisco now that Brandon Aiyuk is out for the season with torn knee ligaments.
Remarkably, first-round rookie receiver Ricky Pearsall had three catches for 21 yards last week in his NFL debut that came 50 days after he was shot in the chest.
‘I saw a lot of room for improvement.’ he said. ‘Obviously being out of training camp and this period of time for the season, there’s a lot of opportunity for me to get better. I just have to go back and do that and grind and do what I normally do and work hard.’
The Niners (3-4) host the Cowboys (3-3) on Sunday night with both teams struggling to show their playoff form from 2023.
Dallas had the week off last week to deal with the sting from a 47-9 loss to Detroit that was the most lopsided at home for the Cowboys since 1988. San Francisco (3-4) lost a hyped Super Bowl rematch against Kansas City and is stumbling toward its bye week after hosting Dallas.
‘We’re in similar spots — two teams that need to right the ship and get on a better trajectory,’ Niners defensive end Nick Bosa said. ‘For them, they’re coming off the bye; we’re heading into it after this. They want to get going and start the second half of their season the right way, and we want to go into the bye feeling good about where we’re at.’
The Cowboys had plenty of time to stew over the blowout loss to the Lions but the real focus during that time off for coach Mike McCarthy’s staff was fixing the problems that led to a pair of blowout losses to New Orleans and Detroit and mostly spotty performances all season.
Dallas has been outrushed by 66 yards per game — the worst mark in the league and fifth worst in franchise history through six games — Dak Prescott and the passing game have been inconsistent and the defense as a whole has struggled under new coordinator Mike Zimmer.
But the biggest issue has been turnovers with the Cowboys committing 11 and generating only five takeaways after leading the NFL with 59 the previous two seasons under Dan Quinn.
‘That’s the huge blinking light for us,’ McCarthy said. ‘I think just like anything in the game of football, where you put your time, the time on task, taking care of the football, taking it away, and we’ve added some drills.’
Key reinforcements on that defense won’t be back for Dallas this week. Star pass rusher Micah Parsons will miss a third consecutive game because of a high ankle sprain, and All-Pro cornerback DaRon Bland’s season debut will have to wait at least one more week as he recovers from foot surgery.
