Seahawks’ Brooks back after ‘amazing’ recovery from ACL injury

By Bob Condotta / The Seattle Times

RENTON — In the midst of talking about his first game back as a Seattle Seahawk on Sunday at Lumen Field after a year in Los Angeles, Bobby Wagner wanted to make sure another return — that of teammate Jordyn Brooks from an ACL injury — isn’t overlooked.

“I hope we don’t just pass on this like this is not a big deal,” Wagner said of Brooks, who is expected to be in the starting lineup when the Seahawks host the Rams at 1:25 p.m.

The game comes just a little over eight months after Brooks suffered a torn ACL against the New York Jets on New Year’s Day. And it’s less than eight months since he had surgery on Jan. 19.

“It’s amazing,” Wagner said. “… (This is) something we should definitely applaud, definitely appreciated. That’s not easy having that type of injury and coming back being ready for the first game, because I think when he got hurt, I don’t think anybody thought that he’s going to be ready for the first game.”

Brooks returned to practice on Aug. 15 after coming off the physically unable to perform list.

At the time, it was unclear how quickly he’d make it back to full participation with coach Pete Carroll saying, “We’re not going to rush him.”

Brooks was able to practice fully within a few days and has had no setbacks. He regained his spot as the starting weakside linebacker alongside Wagner in the middle.

“He’s done well,” Carroll said Wednesday. “… He hasn’t had to back off at any time.”

Carroll said the team will continue to “monitor” how Brooks is doing, and hinted that the team might try to limit his snaps some against the Rams, which would mean giving some playing time to Devin Bush, a former first-round pick of the Steelers who signed a one-year deal in March.

Brooks said he’s hoping he never has to come off the field.

“Knowing me, once I’m out there I don’t see myself coming out,” Brooks said. “I can definitely see myself playing 60 snaps. But at the same time, we’ve all got to be smart. So we’ll see how much I play.”

As Wagner alluded, any snaps at all is a major victory considering that ACL tears are typically at least a nine-month recovery.

One of the few NFL players known to have come back quicker is running back Adrian Peterson, who returned to play every game for the Minnesota Vikings in 2012 after suffering an ACL and MCL injury on Dec. 24, 2011.

Brooks and Peterson were briefly teammates with the Seahawks in 2021. Brooks said he didn’t talk to Peterson after his injury, but he did watch some interviews Peterson gave about his recovery.

“I was like, ‘That’s all I need to hear,’” to know he could also make a quick recovery, Brooks said.

Brooks worked out in the Dallas area with teammate Jamal Adams, who is recovering from a torn quad muscle suffered in the season opener a year ago. Adams is off the PUP list but has yet to return to practice, though Carroll said he hopes that happens next week.

Rookie cornerback Devon Witherspoon also returned to practice this week after sitting out about a month with a sore hamstring.

Getting all three on the field over the next few weeks would finally make the Seahawks at full strength on defense — and with a unit that they think can be vastly improved over last season.

Brooks took over as the middle linebacker last season after Wagner was released and signed with the Rams.

Wagner returned in part as a hedge against Brooks not making it back for the start of the season — or possibly not making it back well into the season. That’s why the team also signed Bush.

With Brooks back, the Seahawks can leave Wagner in the middle and as the leader of the defense and put Brooks back to the WLB spot, where he made a team-record 183 tackles in 2021. Cody Barton played the WLB spot a year ago but signed with Washington as a free agent in March.

Brooks said of teaming again with Wagner that it “felt like he never left. … I feel like for me having another great player to play next to helps my game tremendously.”

This also looms as a pivotal season for Brooks’ career as he enters the final season of his four-year rookie deal signed after the team selected him in the first round in 2020 out of Texas Tech.

At the time, the expectation was that he would eventually take over for Wagner in the middle, as happened last season, and be a key part of the defense for years to come.

Brooks’ injury threw a wrench in those plans as the team decided not to pick up a fifth-year option in his contract that would have paid him a fully-guaranteed $12.7 million in 2024.

After making $2.2 million this season, Brooks can be a free agent next spring.

With Wagner and Bush also on one-year deals, it leaves the Seahawks with some long-term uncertainty at linebacker.

Brooks says he isn’t looking past Sunday’s game and a return that he always believed was possible.

Brooks said when he was told an initial timeline that would likely have had him missing at least some of the season he vowed to beat it.

“They were saying like a year, nine months,” Brooks said. “But I kid you not, I just never believed that.”

While Brooks only had to sit out two games a year ago — the regular-season finale and the wild-card playoff loss — any time on the sidelines was too much, he said.

“I mean, I love football, man,” he said. “It’s the only thing I’ve done in my life. So to kind of have seven months of just sitting down and kind of missing it, missing OTAs and most of training camp, it’s going to be special to be out there.”