All of the shouting on the earth can’t resurrect the 2010s period’s vibrancy, of which Carroll, linebacker Bobby Wagner and quarterback Russell Wilson are the final three tradition carriers. And with the unhappiness that’s been signaled by Wilson, who voiced his displeasure with the offense earlier than the season started, and the staff proprietor Jody Allen, who is alleged to be more and more illiberal of the staff’s efficiency, change could also be within the air.
Wilson, lengthy obsessive about successful the Tremendous Bowl, might demand a commerce if he feels his window for a title in Seattle has handed. And Carroll’s once-contagious enthusiasm might not be sufficient to mitigate the harm from his conservative offense, one which appears higher suited to the Nineteen Seventies than the high-octane 2020s. Normal Supervisor John Schneider, who in his 9 seasons in Seattle constructed these Seahawks, is rumored to be on the recent seat.
These Seahawks, identical as each Seattle squad since that final Tremendous Bowl look on Feb. 1, 2015, stay within the formidable shadow forged by an period now lengthy gone. No shock: That’s the price of greatness. The Legion of Growth groups performed with such a burning ferocity and had been so startlingly good — the protection allowed the fewest factors scored 4 straight seasons, a feat solely beforehand completed by the Nineteen Fifties Cleveland Browns — that you simply watch the Seahawks now and someway count on the previous to be the current.
Then actuality hits.
This isn’t the staff of bombast led by the brash younger cornerback Richard Sherman, who blanketed receivers, dared quarterbacks to throw his approach, and by no means let a perceived slight go unchallenged.
This isn’t the staff of the safeties Kam Chancellor, ripping large receivers off their moorings, or Earl Thomas, darting throughout the sphere to scoop up fumbles and intercept passes sideline to sideline as if catapulted throughout the sphere. This isn’t Michael Bennett anchoring a smothering line of defense.
These assured and sometimes eloquent stars additionally helped usher in an period that allowed the league’s gamers to talk out and get up as by no means earlier than. Sherman and Bennett had been unafraid to inform everybody how good they had been, whereas additionally being greater than prepared to talk out on points like race and police brutality. Lynch’s silence despatched its personal message of defiance.
“There was by no means any sort of backing down for these Seahawks,” says Louis Moore, a professor of historical past at Grand Valley State College in Michigan.
