What’s up Yardbarker??? Hope you had a great rest of the summer!! My off-season ended on such an amazing note. I made the trip to England and Paris that I mentioned the last time I wrote…. I spent about a week promoting our upcoming Halloween, October 31st vs. the Denver Broncos game – you know the 49ers keep me working. The best part was I got to connect with our fans in the UK, which was cool to see, and a chance to get new folks excited about American football.

I took some pictures of course, and here’s a shot of me joking around in Paris right outside the Louvre Museum! The history of the Louvre is just crazy. It started out as a castle, then it was knocked town and rebuilt as an L-shaped palace. That’s not the end. Then, the queen got tired of walking in the rain from her palace to the king’s, so she had the two palaces joined together. I’ve heard of having your own wing or guest house, but two palaces joined together is crazy! The best part is that the palaces were about 2 miles apart…I’m thinking couldn’t they have just hired a driver to take them to and from? What about a horse and buggy for the sister??? LOL.

In total, I spent three days in Paris. As a painter, getting to see so much original art by the masters who I studied in college was a major highlight that I won’t forget. I’ll tell you one thing, it was overwhelming trying to see all of those paintings before I left. There’s never enough time, so I definitely plan to head back there again.

After Paris, I headed back to the Bay area and was surprised to discover that I was named a local hero by The San Francisco Guardian Magazine who put me on the cover. They gave me kudos for launching my annual Vernon Davis Scholarship Fund which gives a deserving student an art scholarship each year. It was such an unexpected honor and I’m sending a big shout out to the good people at The Guardian. Thanks again, I appreciate it!!

What else can I tell you?? Oh yeah, I’ll be on the TV show “Sports Science.” Tune in and you’ll see me having fun dragging the show’s host John Brenkus and then dragging two football dummies weighing about 400 pounds, during a recent taping. John asked me if it was gonna be too heavy. I was like “heavy??? I go up against opponents double his size!”

Pre-season started in July and we’ve gotten off to a great start, three wins. Of course you know coach has us back on an aggressive workout regimen, waking up early, conditioning and hitting the field hard. As most of you know, I sat out a couple games pre-season, but I’m fine. Our team’s all in sync and we’re looking forward to having a great season. See you guys on the field!!