It’s no wonder the Seahawks team of the early 2010’s blew up so quickly after they won the Super Bowl. New reports are claiming that Russell Wilson tried to get both Pete Carroll and GM John Schneider fired during his final season in Seattle, even though Carroll and Schneider built a Super Bowl winning roster around him.
The Russell Wilson-Seahawks breakup drama just never ends.
In a new report from The Athletic (I’ve linked it here and down below), supposedly Russell Wilson tried to get both Pete Carroll and John Schneider fired before his eventual trade from Seattle to the Denver Broncos last offseason. If this is true, then the arrogance and narcissism that brews within Wilson truly does know no bounds.
How can Wilson, who was drafted 75th overall (3rd round pick) in the 2012 draft by John Schneider and mentored into a Super Bowl-winning QB by Pete Carroll, demand and scheme the demise of his two NFL mentor figures? Does the guy have no decency or respect for those who developed him from an undersized, 3rd-round draft pick into one of the best QBs of his generation and a Super Bowl winner?
If this article is to be believed, then I guess not as The Athletic reported that Wilson shamelessly demanded that Carroll and Schneider had to be fired and replaced if he was to stay in Seattle as the starting QB. And, seeing how Wilson was immediately dealt by Schneider to the Denver Broncos in what can only be described as the worst trade in the last 10 years in Denver’s perspective, it’s a good thing Wilson lost out the ultimatum for all Seahawks fans.
I don’t want to rehash how bad Wilson was last season as that is now all water under the bridge with the hiring of Sean Payton as the new Broncos HC, but one can’t look past the changes in Wilson’s day-to-day system by leaving the Seahawks for the Broncos.
Not only was he given full autonomy and free reign over every aspect of the Broncos offense and his training regiment, but he also was allowed to run the offense both he and Nathainel Hackett saw fit. Reversely, Wilson was never given full control over the Seahawks offense by Pete Carroll, and he had to all of the laws and rules set down by Carroll during his early days as a Seattle Seahawk (there was some rumblings that Wilson was given some leeway during the final years that led to friction between him and the Legion of Boom).
So, if you compare how Wilson performs when he’s put in a controlled environment versus one with strict rules and structure, it’s night and day which one suits the QB better.
In Wilson’s 10-year stint with the Seahawks, he averaged 10 wins/season, 3,706 passing yards/season, a 65% completion percentage, 29 passing TDs, 8 INTs, 85 rushing attempts, 469 rushing yards, 2 rushing TDs, and he was named to 9 Pro Bowls, 1 All-Pro team (2nd Team), and won Super Bowl XLVIII.
In Denver last season, he had 4 wins, 3,524 passing yards, a 60.5% completion percentage, 16 passing TDs, 11 INTs, 55 rushing attempts, 277 rushing yards, 3 rushing TDs, and obviously was not named to the Pro Bowl, an All-Pro team, or even made the playoffs.
Now, you didn’t need me to give you all of these stats to show how badly Wilson regressed without the comforts and security of Pete Carroll’s system, but these stats should cement just how poorly Wilson played without a competent system around him.
And it should also tell you that Wilson was a fool to ever even thing about getting Pete Carroll and John Schneider fired as they turned a backup QB in Geno Smith into a Pro Bowl player as the Seahawks finished with a 9-8 record and made the playoffs.
Still, I have to be fair to Wilson and point out that he said on Twitter that he never called for Pete Carroll and John Schneider’s firing as Carroll was “a father figure to him” in Seattle and Schneider “believed in me and drafted me”.
So, I don’t know who to believe, but I do know that this breakup just keeps getting messier with each passing month.
Images Source: Featured Image: (Wikimedia Creative Commons License/Author: andretat94) (andrewtat94, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)
Other Sources: (The Athletic) (Russell Wilson’s first year with Broncos: ‘Too much influence,’ too few wins in disorganized disaster – The Athletic)
