A cut block in a preseason game is going to sideline for weeks a Seahawk crucial to the team’s defense. And season.
Every-down, run-stopping, pass-rushing outside linebacker Uchenna Nwosu will miss up to six weeks because of the knee injury he got in Seattle’s final preseason game Saturday, The News Tribune confirmed Monday night.
The Seahawks are seriously considering placing Nwosu begins on the injured-reserve list. The Seahawks must trim their 90-man preseason roster to 53 players by Tuesday at 1 p.m.
The team could put their $45 million linebacker and top pass rusher from two seasons ago on IR then bring him back after he misses four games, to open a roster spot in that span.
Per NFL rules changed a few years ago, each team can bring up to two players off injured reserve after they miss a minimum of four games. Previously, players on IR missed the entire season.
If Nwosu does not go on injured reserve at the time of roster cuts due to the league Tuesday, that’s a sign the team believes he will be back before the end of September.
Nwosu was injured when Cleveland starting guard Wyatt Teller pulled left in the teams’ preseason finale Saturday night and saw Nwosu rushing free on quarterback Jameis Winston. Teller lowered his head and shoulder and slammed his helmet and shoulder pad into Nwosu’s knee. The cut block spun around Nwosu, who then got hit up high by Browns running back Jerome Ford.
Referee Clay Martin announced he penalized Ford, not Teller, 15 yards for the chop block, defined by the league as a block below the waist by a blocker on a defender who is engaged with another blocker above the waist.
Nwosu immediately went down to Lumen Field chest-first, in pain. Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald, trainers and a team doctor went onto the field to attend to him. After he got up, he flexed his left knee and jogged awkwardly to the sideline. Tyler Lockett, not playing, was the first teammate to greet him as Nwosu came off.
Macdonald talked to one of the sideline officials after the coach got back off the field following the play. As is becoming usual during a game for the new coach, he was not animated or gesturing.
The News Tribune asked Macdonald after the game if he thought Teller’s block was a legitimate “football play,” or borderline dirty.
“I don’t really want to comment on it,” Macdonald said.
“Seemed like an obvious penalty.”
The injury happened one play after Nwosu was penalized for roughing Winston as he was throwing into the arm of Seattle’s linebacker Boye Mafe incomplete on third down.
Nwosu co-led the Seahawks with 9 1/2 sacks in 2022. That earned him a three-year, $45 million contract extension.
He missed the final 11 games of the 2023 season with a torn pectoral muscle. The Seahawks defense went from allowing 79 rushing yards per game with Nwosu playing to 31st in the league against the run surrendering more than 170 yards with Nwosu out.
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