The San Francisco 49ers suffered another devastating injury on Sunday. But, thanks to a strong supporting cast, they found a way to prevail once again.

San Francisco pulled off the biggest playoff upset so far in what’s been a wild wild-card round, defeating the Philadelphia Eagles, 23-19, on the road. Unheralded wide receiver Demarcus Robinson was a major reason behind Sunday’s upset as he hauled in six receptions for a game-high 111 yards and a touchdown en route to winning Tom Brady’s LFG Player of the Game.

When Robinson spoke with Brady after the game, it didn’t take long for him to find the one word to describe the 49ers. 

“If it was one word, I’d say resiliency. Resilient,” Robinson said of his team. “These guys play with resiliency. We’ve got a lot of injuries throughout the year. Even tonight, like you said, losing Kittle, guys stepped up and knew they had to make plays. That’s what we were able to do today, go out and make plays.”

Sunday’s victory also came in comeback fashion for the Niners, who rallied from a 16-10 fourth-quarter deficit despite losing tight end George Kittle in the first half to a torn Achilles.

Robinson’s resiliency was on full display on the 49ers’ opening possession. He turned an intermediate pass from Brock Purdy over the middle into a 61-yard gain, zigzagging through the Eagles’ secondary on his way to Philly’s 16-yard line. He then caught a 2-yard touchdown pass from Purdy to end the drive.

There was possibly no greater sign of the team’s resiliency, however, than the play that gave them a 17-16 lead early in the fourth quarter. After their offense seemed stuck in the mud for most of the game, the 49ers found the end zone when wide receiver Jauan Jennings threw a 29-yard touchdown pass to running back Christian McCaffrey on a trick play.

Robinson was just one of a few supporting characters who contributed to the 49ers’ win. Fullback Kyle Juszczyk had a season-high four receptions for 49 yards, making a pair of big grabs that helped set up touchdowns in the fourth quarter. Defensively, linebacker Garret Wallow had a game-high 11 total tackles after recording just nine total tackles in the regular season. 

The 49ers’ top player in McCaffrey also showed his resilience in the win. McCaffrey turned 21 touches into 114 yards and two touchdowns, with the second TD coming via a 4-yard grab with 2:54 remaining to give the 49ers a decisive 23-19 lead.

“I think the guys are just playing with resiliency, man,” Robinson said of his team. “Everybody knew what we had at stake. Everybody came out there and did their part. So, that helped us get the dub.”

The injury to Kittle was his second serious injury of the season after he missed time earlier in the year due to a hamstring tear. San Francisco has also seen some of its other stars get sidelined for the majority of the year, such as edge rusher Nick Bosa and linebacker Fred Warner.

Warner could potentially return later in the postseason, but another key piece in wide receiver Ricky Pearsall, who missed Sunday’s game, remains in limbo as he battles a knee injury. Of course, Purdy missed time this year due to shoulder and toe injuries that cost him eight games.

Despite all of that, the 49ers will now move on to play for a spot in the NFC Championship Game when they take on the Seahawks in Seattle next weekend. They nearly hosted the divisional round game, but lost to the Seahawks at home, 13-3, in the regular-season finale to give Seattle the NFC West and the conference’s No. 1 seed. 

Robinson is optimistic, however, that there will be a different result this time around. 

“Hopefully, we get the dub, obviously,” Robinson said. “We’ve just got to lock in, man. We’ve got to lock in and put more points on the board than we did last week at home. Just put more points on the board. The defense played lights out tonight. Hopefully, we keep playing that same way, man, and it leads to more dubs.”

Want great stories delivered right to your inbox? Create or log in to your FOX Sports account, and follow leagues, teams and players to receive a personalized newsletter daily!

The music world was busy mourning David Bowie on the 10-year anniversary of his death on Saturday when the devastating word hit that we lost another icon of almost indescribable significance to rock history: Bob Weir. 

“He transitioned peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after courageously beating cancer as only Bobby could,” the Weir family wrote in a public statement. “Unfortunately, he succumbed to underlying lung issues.”

The road was Weir’s home from the moment the Grateful Dead formed in 1965 all the way through last summer. His projects outside the Grateful Dead included RatDog, Furthur, Bob Weir and Wolf Bros, and Dead & Company. At almost any given time, he had shows on the books with at least one of them.

“The interesting thing is, I’ve never made plans,” he told Rolling Stone‘s Angie Martoccio last March. “And I’m not about to, because I’m too damn busy doing other stuff, trying to get the sound right, trying to get the right chords, trying to get the right words, trying to get all that stuff together for the storytelling. And really, making plans seems like a waste of time. Because nothing ever works out like you expected it to, no matter who you are. So why bother?”

Dead & Co. wrapped up a farewell tour in July 2023, but they continued to play residencies at Sphere in Las Vegas throughout 2024 and 2025. And they came together one last time in August 2025 for three shows in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park to celebrate the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary. Throughout the three evenings, they were joined by Billy Strings, Trey Anastasio, Grahame Lesh, and Sturgill Simpson.

These were joyous concerts filled with Deadheads from around the globe, but Weir was holding a secret: He was diagnosed with cancer weeks earlier, and had just started treatment. “Those performances, emotional, soulful, and full of light, were not farewells, but gifts,” the Weir family wrote. “Another act of resilience. An artist choosing, even then, to keep going by his own design.”

The final night wrapped up with “Touch of Grey,” perhaps the most famous tune in the Dead songbook. Weir sang lead, and the band stretched it out for nearly eight minutes. At the end, Weir took a group bow with the full band, waved to the crowd, and then took a special bow with Mickey Hart, the only other original member of the Dead in Dead & Co., before they walked off together. It was his final live appearance. 

“There is no final curtain here, not really,” wrote the Weir family. “Only the sense of someone setting off again. He often spoke of a three-hundred-year legacy, determined to ensure the songbook would endure long after him. May that dream live on through future generations of Dead Heads. And so we send him off the way he sent so many of us on our way: with a farewell that isn’t an ending, but a blessing. A reward for a life worth livin’.”

It’s way too early to seriously contemplate the future of Dead & Co., but it’s somewhat hard to imagine them continuing outside of a tribute concert to Weir. He was the heart and soul of the group.

That said, Weir himself once said he hoped to see the band outlive him. “I had a little flash while we were playing one night,” Weir told Rolling Stone‘s David Fricke in 2016. “It was toward the end of the tour. I don’t remember what city it was in. We were getting into the second set, setting up a tune. We were all playing, but the tune hadn’t begun yet. We were all feeling out the groove, just playing with it. Suddenly I was 20 feet behind my own head, looking at this and kind of happy with the way the song was shaping up. I started looking around, and it was 20 years later. John’s hair had turned gray. Oteil’s had turned white. I looked back at the drummers, and it was a couple of new guys. I looked back at myself, the back of my head, and it was a new guy. It changed my entire perception of what it is we’re up to.”

The members of Dead & Co. will ultimately make the call. And no matter what happens, Grateful Dead music will continue to live on concert stages for decades and decades to come. They are responsible for a significant chapter of the Great American Songbook.