If you step outside Gate C of Levi Stadium and follow Bill Walsh Way along to the San Francisco 49ers practice plant, you will see a dull but obvious electrical substation. Thousands of such stations are scattered all over the U.S. to ensure that the power grid keeps on running, but this particular one elicited strange publicity because it was located close to the Super Bowl venue last season.

This was the season in which the 49ers had their share of injuries, and a theory emerged that somehow the substation near the team had some connection with the health problems of the team. What began as a harmless prank in the locker room quickly caught the attention of the mass media, ultimately moving through social media without any substantiation of it. The general manager of the 49ers, John Lynch, has now come in to put an end to this suggestion permanently in the yearly meetings of the NFL.

“49ers GM John Lynch said the electrical substation injury conspiracy theory is a “big nothing burger,”” NFL insider Adam Schefter posted on X.

Speaking on Sunday, 49ers GM John Lynch stepped in to shut it down completely, “It basically was a big nothing burger. We’re in a safe place of work. … It’s a normal place of work. It’s a normal gym. We are safe, we’re healthy, and we feel really good about that.

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The team also brought in a scientist with more than 45 years of experience studying electromagnetic force (EMFs), and the findings showed no risk to players, according to the 49ers. Those results indicated that the facility was 400 times below the unsafe-environment threshold.

Last season was especially rough for San Francisco. The team lost key players like Nick Bosa with a torn ACL, Fred Warner with a broken ankle, and George Kittle with a torn Achilles to season-ending injuries. At present, there is also some positive news on a couple of injured players.

Lynch mentioned Nick Bosa and Mykel Williams are recovering well from torn ACLs and could participate in training camp, even if in a limited capacity. For the first time, he added that George Kittle, who tore his ACL in the NFC Wild Card win over the Philadelphia Eagles on January 11, might be ready for the start of the season.

Moreover, the 49ers had to deal with injuries that forced key players to be out for a long period of time. Brock Purdy had a turf toe variant in the season opener against the Seahawks. Ricky Pearsall had been dealing with a sprained knee and ankle, but later injured his PCL in a 26-21 loss to the Jaguars after playing in the first four games.

Jauan Jennings was also out with rib, shoulder, and ankle injuries, while Tatum Bethune was out with a groin tear that eventually put him on injured reserve in January.

The 49ers had 20 players on their reserve list during the season, which was more than $95 million in adjusted annual contract value, the highest in the league by almost $20 million, according to OverTheCap.

The 49ers dealt with a major wave of injuries last season, even though they still finished 12-5 in 2025. Their playoff run ended in the Divisional Round with a 41-6 loss to the Seattle Seahawks, the team that went on to win the Super Bowl.

While the team did go through an unusually high number of injuries, the idea that a substation was the cause was just a strange theory that gained traction online and nothing more.

The 49ers’ electrical substation injury conspiracy

Back on January 6, a self-described “board-certified quantum biology practitioner” made a post on X that quickly went viral, racking up 22.2 million views. The post claimed that an electrical substation near the 49ers’ facility in Santa Clara is the reason for players’ injuries, as the magnetic fields from it were weakening players’ collagen and leading to more injuries than other teams experience.

Despite it being just a viral post, the GM took the matter seriously. Once the theory started spreading among fans, 49ers GM John Lynch responded that same month, saying the team would look into it.

According to Lynch, since the issue is about the health and safety of the players, it’s something that needs to be carefully considered and fully examined rather than relying on unverified research. Lynch also made it clear that the team’s focus goes far beyond conspiracy theories and is centered on improving how they handle injuries overall.

“The fact of the matter is injuries are a part of this game,” Lynch said. “What we strive to do is never to eliminate injuries, but to mitigate injuries. And I think we have a lot of good processes. We’ll challenge them all. And that process has begun. It never frankly stopped. But yes, we’ll look at everything, and we’ll examine everything.”

The 49ers followed through on that promise and actually conducted a proper review into whether the nearby substation had any effect on injuries, rather than ignoring the situation.

Even before that, experts had already pushed back on the theory. In fact, Frank de Vocht, a professor of epidemiology and public health at Bristol Medical School in England, who is a leading expert on how EMFs affect humans, called the idea “nonsense.”

At the end of the day, what started as a viral theory fell apart as soon as it was put to the test. Even though this theory got so much attention online, there is no evidence that the substation near the 49ers had anything to do with the team’s injuries.