Abysmal Brock Purdy stats prove the Niners should be desperate for good Deebo Samuel news

The San Francisco 49ers pulled out a 24-21 win in the fourth quarter of their divisional game against the Green Bay Packers, but a key piece of news lingers into Sunday: Deebo Samuel's injury, and his expected availability for next week's NFC Championship.

Samuel left the game twice early, once to be checked for a concussion. After returning, he injured his shoulder and never returned to the game, spending the remainder on the sideline in street clothes.

Samuel is getting more tests done on Sunday. The Niners should know more soon, and they should be desperately hoping for good news, because without him, Brock Purdy will be severely limited.

Brock Purdy, Niners have struggled without Deebo Samuel

A lingering aspect of the concern here is the fact that Samuel injured this shoulder earlier in the year, suffering a hairline fracture that kept him sidelined for two games in Weeks 7 and 8. The Niners lost both of those games to the Minnesota Vikings and Cincinnati Bengals, scoring four touchdowns across the two games and scoring 17 points total in both.

Analysts will remain split over Purdy's performance on Saturday night. Some think it was another chapter in his playoff excellence, and to his credit, walking away with a win is ultimately all that matters. But statistically speaking, Purdy's contributions appear questionable.

He passed for 252 yards, but 116 of those yards came in yards-after-catch yards.

In terms of win probability added, air yards actually pulled the Niners likelihood of winning down by 1.6 percent, while the win probability added from yards after the catch was 20.23 percent. Receivers deserve a great deal of credit for what they did to make Purdy look good on Saturday and all year long.

Samuel specifically was a huge part of making Purdy look good this season. The dynamic rushing receiver averaged 0.3 percent added to win probability with his air yards on targets from Purdy, and more importantly, was Purdy's second-best target in producing win probability with air yards.

Purdy will need to utilize tight end George Kittle and receiver Brandon Aiyuk even more in the game plan if Samuel can't go for the title game. Aiyuk was his best target in terms of completion percentage over expected, EPA per play, and air win probability added per play all year.

But even though they'll have Aiyuk available, Samuel is a part of that strategy, too, often drawing the defense to create receiving opportunities for others.

For obvious reasons, the Niners have fingers crossed as they await results of tests on Samuel's shoulder.