Chargers Injury News: Manti Te'o injures foot, out against 49ers

For the second year in a row, Manti Te'o has injured his foot in the preseason against the Seattle Seahawks. Last year, Te'o injured his right foot in the first preseason game, and ended up missing the rest of preseason, along with the first three games of his rookie season.

This time it's a sprained left foot, as Mike McCoy has already declared him out for next Sunday's game against the San Francisco 49ers.

"It's not the same injury, it's something completely different," McCoy told reporters at his press-conference yesterday. "When he's ready, he'll be back out there."

Te'o came back in week 4 against the Cowboys, and started each game for the remainder of the year, finishing with 61 tackles, good for 5th on the team. His play looked to have been affected by the injury, but was able to turn things around the second half of the season, and looked to improve on that performance heading into this year.

"There's been a lot of growth for me both scheme-wise and confidence-wise," Te'o told Chargers.com earlier this month. "It just feels good to be out here, step on a field and have some level of confidence going into each practice."

After off-season foot surgery, Te'o came into camp with a renewed confidence, as he looked to have a bigger role on this defense, and has looked good so far, with 9 combined tackles while seeing limited action in two preseason games.

The Chargers have Kavell Conner, Andrew Gachkar, and Reggie Walker to play next to Donald Butler until Te'o is healthy enough to return to the lineup, with Melvin Ingram an option as well.

Jahleel Addae has also been declared out for this next game with a minor hamstring injury, while Sean Lissemore out as well to continue to rehab his ankle.

For Te'o, these durability issues are new to him, after playing every single game in the four years he starred at Notre Dame.

The Chargers hope to see them all healthy by the start of the season, as losing any one of them for a prolonged period of time could be crucial for a team looking to improve off of last year's success.