BBK (Ben Burr-Kirven Mini Movie)

you don't really know what's gonna happen your you know your agent can kind of tell you and hopefully prognosticator a little bit what's gonna happen I think that it makes it especially nerve-wracking because the the projection for so all over the place the NFL is evolving that every team's gonna need at least one Ben Burke Irvin may become one of the biggest deals of the 2019 NFL Draft Seattle Seahawks like [Music] when you think of the hometown of a future NFL star you might think of Southern California West Texas South Florida or perhaps the coal towns of western Pennsylvania let's face it the first location off your tongue isn't Silicon Valley and it isn't Sacred Heart Prep founded in 1898 the tiny Catholic school in Atherton California was originally a boarding school for girls finally in 1984 more than 80 years after its start Sacred Heart Prep began to admit boys it wasn't until its 100th anniversary in 1998 that the school introduced its first ever football team I just wanted to go to a school that would have a football program that I thought would be good in terms of academics it was probably the best of the place I was looking at and in terms of football I feel like it's a place where I'd have a good opportunity to get to play the next level despite becoming one of the greatest football players known to come from Northern California in the past ten years first impressions of Ben or Earvin weren't always what you'd expect the one characteristic that stood out was his hair man a lot a tiny kid with all the flowing along hair I just heard about the sunshine kid he had this long blonde hair but he was tiny but my son's had told me that from two days he was special his quickness and his speed to the ball especially was noticeable right away and even though I thought he was going to be a good high school football player I really didn't know what impact he was going to have moving forward [Music] he just bald and bald and bald and all as almost as a ven made every tackle I think in every game Ben was involved in some instrumental tackle or catch or run his sophomore junior and senior year 12 13 and 14 their 38 and 3 playing in 35 varsity games is a three year starter for SHP Burke Irvin recorded a combined total of 238 tackles as well as 15 sacks and six interceptions our final game against Bellarmine in the ccs open championship and our team was a huge underdog essentially told not even to show up that there's some question about whether or not we should even be playing Bell ermine our kids were gonna get hurt playing against this er perennial power everyone laughs we'd never been in the open division we were supposed to get you know clobbered by the wcl guys we're supposed to be the end of the road to this great team and what ended up happening actually we shut them down they couldn't really do anything on offense they maybe past 50 once or twice so and Ben was everywhere and they just couldn't move the ball when we needed to do something Ben will do it they just got stopped it was not 14 nothing and we barely won it was 14 nothing and we stomped on them Sacred Heart Prep ending its season undefeated at 13 and oh very emotional tonight why is that I mean it's the culmination of four years of a hard work and I mean we've put so much into this and to win the open division championship I mean this is bigger than anything we shut everyone up tonight no one no one ever says anything about us again we just beat a wcl football team and we were able to impose our will all night I mean we shut them out congratulations Ben congratulations shaker heart preparators open division [Applause] despite all he accomplished a Sacred Heart Brook Ervin's college recruiting process was anything but a smooth ride for the undersized linebacker when he had gone to the camps everybody tried to convert him into a safety to me I was assumed he wasn't big enough to be a linebacker I was assumed he was gonna add playing safety he's fast he's super smart he moves incredibly well on the field and but what came out of that was he did not have safety DNA he God made him a linebacker what was clear is that Ben wants to play linebacker finally on September 14 2014 Ben Burke Irvin committed to the University of Washington [Music] I just went up there and met the coaching staff and they talked to coach Pete and he's reminded me a lot of coach lob they have a program what they're called men even super men Bofur this year and then they had built for life up there and it was Ruiz similar principles so from you know outside of just the football side it just felt it felt comfortable especially in a small town like this where you don't get a lot of pac-12 SEC big 10 football players so for Ben to be committed to play at that caliber was really exciting Chris Peterson made the commitment to him at Washington and he wanted to play an NFL and he wanted to be a linebacker so that path playing for Peterson and and being a linebacker was what he wanted to do and it makes perfect sense when Ben Burke Irvin arrived at the University of Washington the Huskies were in the midst of a cultural change largely driven by the arrival of head coach Chris Peterson the prior year I mean my freshman year I played mostly just special teams did some spot duty on defense and then we were we were not great we we were six and six we made a bowl we want our ball game to end up being seven and six but it was a pretty rough year it was frustrating cuz you know we felt like we should be winning we were playing good ball here right there so many times going to that next year there was just a different feeling and we ended up being real good we went 12 and won we won the pac-12 when played Alabama and that was crazy to go play you know Alabama down in down the south we played in Georgia and basically an enemy territory and hearing all the SEC chants and all this stuff and they got after is pretty good but I think you know for an experiences one of the most incredible things we'd ever imagine I mean a lot of NFL town on that field and you know be there as a sophomore it was pretty special experience in August training camp before a junior year Burke Irvin found himself in a heated competition for a starting role the Huskies kicked off the 2017 season by traveling cross-country to play the Rutgers Scarlet Knights our starting linebacker was suspended for the first game of my junior year and so I end up starting the game and I played well we kind of split time he was starting reapply playing 5050 in terms of reps and then I think it was game five or six we had a we had a bye week at that and after the bye week I started the rest of the way over the middle gets picked off it's Ben Burke herb interception [Music] Ben Burke Irvin finished 2017 with 84 tackles leading the team the Huskies would go on to finish ten and three make an appearance in the Fiesta Bowl against the Penn State Nittany Lions after being voted team captain BBK returned to the Huskies for his senior season and I really wanted to to enjoy one more year with my friends and that was kind of the best part about college ball is and you get to stay with the same guys you know you kind of come in as a family when you're recruit his freshman you you ride through so there's guys you know that for four years we're you know we're pretty much all you'd see every single day so for me that last year was just about enjoying you know the time with those guys and getting to keep playing ball and being proud to be a husky that's good step to the 10 [Applause] loosen up picked off by bedbug [Applause] balls loose / kirpan jumps on the swing pass to spit what the man all three timeouts for the boss that boss picked off and just might do it Ben Burke : team tackles a pass break up an interception that he takes back 21 yards [Music] as a senior in 2018 Burke Irvin led the entire college football nation with 176 tackles in addition to two interceptions for forced fumbles and three recoveries the Huskies finished the year with 10 wins enough to win the pac-12 championship and earned an appearance in the Rose Bowl we would like to win the Rose Bowl but in terms of the season he knows it was really special we had um we had some tough loss here in there but at the end of the day I mean won the pac-12 title and we went to the Rose Bowl and you know I had a had a good year individually but I mean it was just cool despite leading the nation in tackles and inspiring his team to a pac-12 championship and Rose Bowl appearance Ben was overlooked and underestimated once again this time by NFL scouts who questioned whether he had the size to be NFL linebacker short Stefon when I watched him on TV he's had some work out of eject that's a great time at the NFL Combine in May 2019 Ben Burke Irvin turned heads he let all linebackers in the three cone drill was top five in the 40-yard dash and even top ten in the bench press and finally it was on to the NFL Draft you don't really know what can happen you know your agent can kind of tell you and hopefully prognosticator a little bit what's gonna happen but especially for something with like me where you know I had the production but physically and stuff like that I wasn't quite you know the prototypical prospect I think that it makes it especially nerve-racking because the projections were so all over the place the NFL is evolving I had spoken with my oldest son who's into sports and he's at the opinion that every team's going to need at least one bemberg Irvin in about three years and it yeah Ben may be coming out a little bit early hello how you doing this is John Schneider good to hear from ya that sounds awesome thank you yeah it's awesome that makes life a lot easier the Seattle Seahawks drafted Ben Burke Irvin in the fifth round with a hundred and forty second overall pick it was awesome you know I saw the I recognized the area code on the phone when they called me and I didn't think I didn't think they would take me because they drafted another linebacker earlier in the draft but when I saw that number I knew that was the only only team it could be and it was you know an amazing feeling to get to stay in a place that's been my home you know for the last four years and so getting to stay there really couldn't have worked out any better I mean with the veteran leadership and the linebacker room the coaching staff it was kind of a perfect transition I saw what their linebackers looked like so with their draft picks looked like in thought okay this this is a great landing spot when I realized he was gonna play on Sunday is I was just so happy for him because there's no one more deserving than Ben when he was ten years old he told his mom he was gonna play in the NFL yeah she just kind of rolled her eyes and said whatever he was athletic etc he wasn't very big but he kept building towards that Ben was someone not consistently almost as like an underdog was achieving working hard and relentlessly becoming as good as he knew he could be there's a lot of really good athletes and a lot of people that want to play football I think almost all athletes at some point you know if they could be a football player that's what they want to do but I think that football is just a different sport I mean there's an attitude required to go out there and do this game and take the hits and give out the hits that you do and I think that the best players I've ever seen haven't always been the best athletes or the best talents it's been the guys that that are willing to basically go out there and die on the field for the guys next time and I think that the way that the way that people carry themselves and whether people care for the game is the thing that puts people over the edge you [Music] you

Channel: Seattle Native

Views: 1,820

Rating: 5 out of 5

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Id: 6JCWi_j_QWU

Length: 14min 39sec (879 seconds)

Published: Mon May 25 2020