Thursday.However he was adamant that his strained left calf is not related to his other more serious leg problems of the past year.Sherman hurt his calf in the second quarter of Sunday's loss at Kansas City and didn't return. Team officials said he'll miss at least two games San Francisco 49ers T-Shirt , though Sherman said the only certainty was that he'd be sidelined for this Sunday's road game against the Los Angeles Chargers.The three-time All-Pro missed the final seven games of last season after having surgery to repair a ruptured right Achilles tendon. But given that he also had surgery on his left Achilles during the offseason, Sherman was asked whether his current left leg injury might be connected to past issues."It just makes it an easy story for you guys. Makes it lazy reporting," Sherman said. "But nah, it's getting back out there and going through the trials and tribulations of a season, wear and tear of football and taking all these reps after not taking them for eight months. Your body's gotta get used to it again."The 30-year-old Sherman missed a practice leading into the Chiefs game for what the team described as a "heel" issue, so he at least was on the injury radar even before Sunday.His absence is a damaging blow for a 49ers pass defense that ranks 27th in the NFL at 287.7 yards allowed per game. The Chargers enter Sunday ranked fifth in total offense (415.3 yards per game).Jimmie Ward, who has spent part of his career at safety, is expected to start in Sherman's place. Second-year player Ahkello Witherspoon, who struggled two weeks ago against Detroit, likely will man the other cornerback spot.Compounding things is that both of San Francisco's starting safeties, Adrian Colbert and Jaquiski Tartt, are battling injuries and their status is unknown for Sunday.But aside from health, the biggest issue for San Francisco's defense has been poor tackling through the first three games. Defensive coordinator Robert Saleh said his unit is getting back to basics in practice, drilling on fundamentals even when the team is out of pads."It's very clear when you turn on the tape that we're actually lunging and ducking our heads at the point of attack," Saleh said. "When you teach tackling, everything that we talk about is you've got to run your body through their body."Get a body on a body, step on their toes San Francisco 49ers Hats , wrap up, keep your feet moving, drive for five and get them to the ground."The biggest culprits last Sunday were inside linebackers Reuben Foster and rookie Fred Warner, who missed six and four tackles respectively. Those two are believed to be a promising young core of the 49ers defense.But Sunday was Foster's season debut after serving a two-game suspension. Saleh said Foster may have been knocking rust off, but the linebacker wasn't letting himself off the hook."That's uncalled for, just missing tackles like that," Foster said. "That's not like us as a team and that's not like me."NOTES: Tartt (shoulder) missed Thursday's practice as did guard Joshua Garnett (toe). Colbert (hip), running back Alfred Morris (knee) and guard Mike Person (knee) were limited. . Foster used "Roody-poo" in a quote earlier this week, a term made famous by "The Rock" during his wrestling days. Foster was delighted that the Hollywood star referenced it on Twitter. "It was amazing," Foster said of the shout-out.The 49ers have faced worse and will keep it together The San Francisco 49ers 0-9 start to the 2017 season was one of the worst things that the franchise has had to face. This season has started out nearly as tough with the offense being decimated by injuries amidst a 4-1 start to the season. They have failed to put a complete game together, and we saw it again on Sunday. Facing the Arizona Cardinals, the 49ers offense ran 92 plays and had 33 first downs and 447 yards of offense. Unfortunately, they turned the ball over five times.The team was frustrated after the game but there was no infighting, which is a good thing. In several of the post game interviews you can see that there is ownership from mistakes and no finger pointing which is incredibly valuable. Here are a select group of quotes from players and Kyle Shanahan which exemplify the closeness of the locker room which will only help the team as they try to push through the rough patch of this season: C.J. Beathard“Obviously, after a loss like that it doesn’t feel good for anybody. We’re going to stay positive throughout it all because we’ve got to move on to the next week. Obviously, we’ll watch the tape of this one, learn from it and get better from it. But San Francisco 49ers Hoodie , you can’t dwell on it for the next few days. Obviously, today and tonight will hurt and sting but you’ve got to get past it.”Mike McGlinchey“Football is a game that tests you all of the time. Unfortunately we have a rough couple of weeks by going 1-4 and not being able to close out games and having bad bounces go against us. Today was obviously another day of that. I am not worried about the character of this team at all. Kyle addressed us after the game and he is not either. The guys that we have here are awesome and ready to play and win. We just have to execute a little bit better. It is not recreating the wheel, it is just little things that we have to do a little bit better each and every week to get a little more consistent at. I think we can start turning the tide a little bit.”Kyle Shanahan“I sensed the same thing. Guys are frustrated. Our guys are working. They are putting a lot of work in and when you go through some of that stuff it’s tough. We’re all competitive people and we want this to change and we know it will. But, no, I think we’ve got a tight group of guys. I think we’ve got guys who work hard. I think it’s going to take a couple days to get over this, just like it always does and I believe our guys will show up. We’ve got eight days now to get ready for Green Bay. Tomorrow, except for the injured guys, they’ll get it off and we’ll come in on Tuesday and treat that like a Monday and go through this hard with all the guys. And by the time they show up on Thursday, we’ll have a new game plan for them and they’ll be ready to go.”DeForest Buckner It says a lot. We found out what the problem was on that play, and we moved on and shut it down. Guys continued to play the game we know we can play. It shows a lot to the guys on the sideline, not pointing any fingers and figuring out the problem and solving it.Matt Breida“Just get better. We have to really dig deep and see what our team is made of now. This is not where we planned on being at, but this is where we are. We just have to overcome adversity.”Adrian Colbert“On Josh Rosen’s 75-yard touchdown pass to open the game: It was just an undisciplined play by me. I saw Larry [Fitzgerald] flash and it was just a bad play on my part. It is something that I have to correct.”Cassius Marsh“I’m proud of the way everybody fought til the end. It’s just rough. I’ve seen teams across from me because, I’ve played on several teams, they get to screaming at each other. You can see it on the field and on the sidelines. I don’t ever see that here. It’s all about supporting one another. We’re close here. Everybody loves everybody. We know we have to get back to work and get better.”