SEATTLE — Seahawks running back Chris Carson is retiring at the age of 27 due to a neck injury, according to the NFL Network.
With the Seahawks reporting to training camp in Renton on Tuesday, the team has reportedly given Carson a failed physical designation and will officially release him.
The NFL Network reported that Carson “won’t make a retirement statement, just in case his neck dramatically improves” but the expectation is he will not be able to play again. The NFL Network reported that designation will allow Carson to receive “several million” in injury protection benefits.
Carson had one year remaining on a contract he signed in March 2021 that was due to pay him a non-guaranteed salary of $4.5 million this year. That contract included $5.5 million in guaranteed money.
Carson did not play after the fourth game of last season due to a neck injury. He then had cervical-fusion surgery in December. The team had hoped he would be cleared to take part in the offseason program and minicamp. But he was not able to pass a physical then, and coach Pete Carroll spoke ominously at that time of Carson’s future.
“Our guys love this game that they grow up playing, and when they sense that there may be an end to it, it’s hard. It’s difficult, and it’s real,” Carroll said. “And we’re going to love him through it and help him as much as possible, if that’s the case, like we do with everybody when it comes to the end of it. It’s inevitable. It’s coming, but it’s always too soon, so we’re trying to fight that.”
Carson told Heavy.com in June he hoped to keep playing saying: “Oh, we still going right now. I see myself playing until I feel like stopping. My mindset is never to give up. So I’m staying positive like I said, and continue to fight and get back onto the field.”
But for now, it appears Carson’s career is over, with Carroll saying in June the two had talked about that possibility.
“We had a real good chance to hang out with him and feel him, and he’s concerned because he wants to play,” Carroll said. “He loves the game, and he’s a worker, you know. He wants to work and push and all that, (but) there’s some things that he was still a little bit restrained to do. So he wasn’t quite ready to do everything at that time, and it’s just hard on him.”
Carson came to Seattle as a seventh-round draft pick in 2017 out of Oklahoma State and emerged as one of the team’s best late-round selections in recent years, immediately earning a starting role. But he suffered a leg injury four games into his rookie season and missed the rest of the year.
He played 41 of a possible 48 games over the following three seasons, though, rushing for a career-high 1,230 yards in 2019.
He is eighth on Seattle’s all-time rushing yardage list with 3,502 yards and sixth in rushing touchdowns with 24.
Seattle anticipated that Carson might not be able to play this season by drafting Ken Walker III out of Michigan State in the second round in April. Seattle also re-signed Rashaad Penny to a one-year deal in March, and Penny and Walker now become the team’s running back duo heading into 2022 with Tuesday’s news on Carson.
“He’s been one of my favorite Seahawks ever,” Carroll said in June. “I’ve loved what he stood for and what he brought, and we’d love to have him back again. He’s a very special player and a very special competitor. We’ll keep our fingers crossed. … We’re all pulling for him.”
