A serious knee injury cost Ben Burr-Kirven two seasons of his NFL career. It was not, however, the end of his football journey.
The Seahawks signed Burr-Kirven on Thursday, bringing back a player who has missed two full seasons due to a knee injury suffered in a 2021 preseason game, and capping an impressive comeback from an injury that involved nerve damage in addition to a torn ACL, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll explained in January.
In 2018 BBK, as he’d know to most Husky fans, was a first team All-American and Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year.
That year he lead the country with 176 total tackles (ranking third with 94 solos) and also posting 5.5 tackles for loss, two sacks, two interceptions, six pass breakups, three fumble recoveries and four forced fumbles.
He was the 142nd player taken in the 2019 NFL Draft by the Seattle Seahawks.
Burr-Kirven, a former University of Washington standout who was named the Pat Tillman Pac 12 Defensive Player of the Year as a senior, joined the Seahawks as a fifth-round pick in the 2019 draft and quickly emerged as a core special teams contributor as a rookie. Over his first two seasons, he recorded 13 special teams tackles while also serving as a backup inside linebacker.
Burr-Kirven unfortunately suffered a knee injury during the 2021 preseason, causing him to spend that season on the injured reserve list, and when the nerve issues persisted, the 2022 season on the reserve/physically unable to perform list. Burr-Kirven was then released in March.
“He’s in a little bit of an experimental mode,” Carroll said in January. “The surgeries that he has had and the process he is going through, he is making progress. He’s always in the weight room with us. He’s always here working with a tremendous mentality. The nerve issues, really intricate stuff going on, so he’s had to have a really good attitude about it to stay in the fight and he is. He’s planning on getting back out there. So, we are going to give him every chance. If he can do it, this is going to be the place that he does it.”
