The moment Paul Allen, Russell Wilson bonded: during Seahawks’ celebration--over Frank Sinatra

Russell Wilson has a precise moment he realized Paul Allen was not only his Seahawks team owner, a multi-billionaire and Microsoft co-founder who gave billions to better the world—but a cool dude and a real guy, too.

“I’ll give you a little story,” Wilson said before Thursday’s practice for Sunday’s game at Detroit. “So, we win the NFC championship game, the second year (for Wilson in the NFL, in January 2014, over San Francisco), and we’re on stage. I’ll never forget this: being onstage and we’re singing Frank Sinatra.

“We’re headed to New York (to play in the Super Bowl there) and everything. ‘Come Fly with Me’ and everything else. We’re headed to New York and everybody’s excited and everybody’s just – the confetti is flying around and everything else.

“And I’m singing—I can’t sing very good—so, I’m singing…And Paul comes up to me and he goes, ‘You like Frank?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I like Frank.’ I’ve always listened to it. I’m a huge Michael Jackson fan. Michael Jackson. Frank Sinatra. Rat Pack. Everything else.

“Sure enough—I didn’t know Paul loved music that much—sure enough the next day, I had a little note, and it had a bunch of old CDs of his that he had, just personal CDs and everything else of his that he had of the Rat Pack and Frank Sinatra.

“It was just a cool little gift, you know, of just thinking about music and everything else. Nothing huge.

“But (that’s) just the kind of person than he was.”

Allen died last week at the age of 65 following complications from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. The man Forbes estimated last year to be worth $20 billion gave more than $2 billion to philanthropic causes. Those included brain research, the environment, space exploration, a music museum in Seattle Center downtown, formerly known as the Experience Music Project, and more.

Owning the Seahawks was but a bit piece to Allen’s worldwide legacy and impact. But he was usually in the locker room after games, home and away, win or lose, greeting and slapping the backs of players. That is, until this season when he turned seriously ill.

Wilson marveled Thursday at the opportunities he had with Allen “just to be able to talk to him about, not just his success, but also the things that he had gone through.”

“Obviously, having cancer early on in his life (Allen had it three times before his death) and everything else, and what that meant and all the things that he’s done around cancer, brain research and everything else,” Wilson said.

“The thing about Paul is he always had a purpose to everything he did. I think that that purpose will live forever. I think that purpose will continue to impact lives, impact communities.

“He was a quiet guy, for sure—but I think that, Paul, if you really got to know him, he wasn’t very quiet. He loved music. He loved people. I think that’s what he did and that’s part of the reason why he probably wanted to create Microsoft and do all the things. He was very creative. But ultimately, I think he loved people more than anything else.”

Allen had on file with the NFL a succession plan for Seahawks ownership, as every owner is required by the league to do and update. But no one knows what that succession plan is. The Seahawks have yet to make a statement on who will be the next owner of the team.

Wednesday, a report from Portland said Allen’s sister Jody Allen was appointed by the family as the executor and trustee of Allen’s estate.

Allen also owned the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers. The Seahawks are in the same standing as the Blazers, asset-wise.

Jody Allen is the vice-chair of First & Goal Inc. the company Paul Allen formed to run the Seahawks when he bought the team 32 years ago from Ken Behring to keep it in Seattle. Jody Allen has been thought to eventually become more visible in an ownership role with the Seahawks.

This week coach Pete Carroll said in the day-to-day nothing has changed between the team’s football operations and its ownership level since Allen’s death. Carroll is still talking regularly with Bert Kolde, Allen’s vice chairman of the Seahawks, and of the Blazers. Carroll has talked directly to Kolde and Allen as his connection to ownership throughout his coaching tenure in Seattle.

Carroll said he’s met with Seahawks players to assure them the operations of the team from the inside is not changing in the wake of Allen’s death.

“You know, I made an effort to ensure the players of the same thought: We are fine. Everything is going to be doing it like we’ve been doing it,” Carroll said. “We’ll carry on with the same expectations and intensity and support, and all of that.

“And that it was our job, really, to carry on in the fashion that Paul wanted us to, how he designed this to happen. We have that responsibility. Everybody is excited about doing that.”

This story was originally published October 26, 2018 at 7:37 AM.