49ers’ Ricky Pearsall ‘finds positives in darkness’ of rookie season

SANTA CLARA — The most touching moment of the 49ers’ season: when Ricky Pearsall’s first career catch prompted a standing ovation from fans in his Oct. 20 debut at Levi’s Stadium.

Everyone was on his side, knowing he overcame a gunshot wound through his chest, suffered just seven weeks earlier in an attempted robbery in San Francisco’s Union Square.

If that round of applause Oct. 20 didn’t highlight his rookie year, perhaps it was his first touchdown Nov. 10 at Tampa Bay, or the...