The Ravens gave fans one of the best moments of every NFL offseason on Monday, sharing video of Baltimore general manager Eric DeCosta personally telling undrafted rookies Joe Fagnano and Ethan Burke that they'd officially made the team's 53-man roster.
The best moment every year 🥹
— Baltimore Ravens (@Ravens) August 31, 2026
EDC tells undrafted rookies @joefagnano and @eburke4lax that they've officially made the 53-man roster: pic.twitter.com/uyKmhBNbyn
For both players, the moment capped a preseason that made cutting them nearly impossible. Fagnano turned in a summer strong enough that Baltimore chose to carry three quarterbacks for the first time in years, completing 56 of 75 passes for 489 yards and three touchdowns across the preseason.
"Pretty surreal," Fagnano said on Monday, day after being told he made the team. "Obviously, all the emotions were going pretty fast. [I] didn’t really know what to expect when I was called into the office. When he told me... I knew I had confidence in myself and the way I played, but you just never know how things are going to shake out. It was super cool to hear that from the ‘GM’, and now I have kind of come back down to Earth and realize that I have a job to do — whatever I can to help this team win games.
"From what I was told from vets and guys that have been through this, it’s like ‘no news is good news.’ When I got that text and the call to come in, immediately you start going through the situations in your head of what might be happening. So, yes — I was surprised. But that’s not to say I didn’t have confidence in myself. I know I am a good football player. I think I belong in this league."
Burke, an undrafted linebacker out of Texas who originally committed out of high school to Maryland to play lacrosse, forced fumbles in back-to-back games and brought exactly the kind of disruptive, high-motor energy that turns tryout players into real roster considerations.
"I was just like, ‘I have nothing to lose, [so] just go out there and play fast, don’t overthink, don’t overcomplicate things, play my best, play how I know I can play and how I’ve played in the past," Burke said on Monday.
He's originally from Maryland, before the family moved to Texas, and his mom posted pictures on Instagram of Burke wearing a Ray Lewis jersey as kid. "That was a jersey I wore a lot, and one of my favorite players for sure, so it’s special," Burke said. "That was a Halloween costume multiple years in a row, for sure.”
It's the kind of scene that plays out on rosters across the league every cutdown weekend, but rarely gets caught on camera — a front-office executive delivering the news a long shot spent an entire summer -- and years -- hoping to hear.