“Everything on this team was on the rise”

Georgia Tech needed help in the transfer portal at the cornerback position this offseason and luckily for them, they had a player from Atlanta who had plenty of SEC experience. Warren Burrell played at North Gwinnett High School before leaving to play for the Volunteers, but he entered the transfer portal after last season. He ended up choosing Georgia Tech and after practice yesterday, he went into detail about what made him want to come play for the Yellow Jackets:

“Oh, man. I mean, I was, I’m from here. So, you know, I was home through the whole recruiting process. I had a couple visits and everything just lined up. You know, I had a whole plan on what I wanted to do. And then I had, I have some connections here as far as Coach Stewart, you know, the high school head coach, AJ Artis, Byron, you know, those guys with my strength coaches up there at Tennessee. So I got a call, you know, from one of my high school coaches talking about, you know, like Georgia Tech, what you think about staying home, I’d never been on this campus before. So it was like, that was my first time. So, when I came here, it was just, it was amazing. I love the city of Atlanta. You know, having the campus right here in the middle of it. It’s really cool. I kind of look at it. And then, you know, from the football aspect, it’s a team that’s on the rise. You know what? What do you mean? Everything about this team was on the rise. I believe in myself enough to help give that push. So it all ticked all the boxes. It made sense.”

Burrell also talked about whether playing in the NFL influenced his decision at all when he was trying to find a new school:

“Yeah, yeah. I mean, you can come into the league from anywhere. As far as the main thing for me, it was just being able to get a chance to put things on tape, make good plays. And, you know, I felt like this was the best place to give me the opportunity to do that, you know, be with a staff that, you know, believes in me, trusts me, man, and it doesn’t get any better than that. So, you know, that’s on me, doing my job.”

Burrell will be one of the Yellow Jackets’ most important players this season and could be one of their most impactful.

He played in 40 games during his time at Tennessee and started 22 of them. Over his career, he has accumulated 89 total tackles, nine PBUs, one interception and one fumble recovery.

According to PFF (Pro Football Focus), Burrell played 1,647 snaps during his career in Knoxville, with 823 of those snaps coming in 2021. His best season from a PFF grading perspective was last season. He finished with a 68.0 overall grade on defense, 67.3 on run defense, a very good 82.0 grade on tackling, and a 67.2 grade on coverage. In all of his seasons with the Volunteers, Burrell graded well as a tackler and that’s going to be very important as tackling was a big issue for Georgia Tech last season at all positions.