After one start, Travis Homer has earned trust of the Seahawks — particularly Marshawn Lynch
Travis Homer knew about Marshawn Lynch, the player.
The Seahawks’ rookie running back learned tons more about Marshawn Lynch, the teammate and person, during Homer’s first NFL start Sunday night in the NFC West title game.
Lynch, 33, came up to Homer on the sideline during the tense game against San Francisco. He told Homer during a Seattle kickoff after a score: “I’m feeding off you. ...You’re inspiring me right now.”
A living legend within the Seahawks’ locker room, their smashmouth soul during their back to back Super Bowls in 2014 and 2015, telling a 21-year-old rookie he was inspiring him?
Yeah, Homer was wowed.
“It was definitely a cool moment for me,” Homer said Wednesday, four days before he and Lynch become perhaps the franchise’s most unlikely running-back tandem for a playoff game when Seattle (11-5) plays in the NFC wild-card round at Philadelphia (9-7).
“To have one of the greatest come up to me and say what he said, I took that to the heart.”
It wasn’t just the 92 yards from scrimmage (62 yards rushing and 30 receiving) Homer had. It was his first start since Seattle lost 1,230-yard running back Chris Carson and No. 2 Rashaad Penny to season-ending injuries.
Lynch was blowing Homer away even before Sunday night’s game against the 49ers.
Lynch told the team that he wanted Homer, recently signed Robert Turbin and Lynch all introduced among the offensive starters running out of the tunnel just before kickoff.
So that’s what they did. Lynch made sure his return to the Seahawks didn’t upstage the rookie or fellow veteran Turbin.
“That was Marshawn,” Homer said. “I didn’t really know what we were doing at first, because he didn’t explain it. But when I saw what was going on I was like, ‘OK, this is actually pretty cool.’”
These are the latest examples of why Lynch has been so revered in the Seahawks’ locker room since he arrived there in a trade from Buffalo during the 2010 season. Among the players, Lynch’s selflessness and willingness to share and help are as legendary as his Beast Quake run, crotch-grab dives into the end zone, smashing through defenders and winning the Super Bowl.
“It’s kind of a classic mentoring moment when the guy that you look up to, and Homer does look up to him for years and years when he was growing up,” coach Pete Carroll said. “He made that comment that Marshawn was a big deal to him. To have that kind of willingness on the part of 24 to share himself and share his scars and all that and pump him up and all, praise him, too, it’s really powerful. It’s a real tribute to Marshawn.
“I know he won’t talk to you guys (in the media),” Carroll said with a grin, “but he’ll talk to our guys.”
Actually, Lynch has spoken to the media in Seattle twice since he signed back after 14 months away from the game last week. Or about two more times than he did his final couple of seasons in his first go-round on the Seahawks ending after the 2015 season.
“He’s a funny dude. He’s a funny dude,” Homer said twice for emphasis.
“Actually, the first thing he probably said to me (when he met Homer last week) was a joke.”
Homer spent the first 3 1/2 months of the regular season exclusively as a special-teams player, the fourth running back behind Carson, Penny and C.J. Prosise. Then Carson, Penny and Prosise all got season-ending injuries in the span of three games. Homer’s first rushes and yards in the regular offense came Dec. 15 in the 14th game of the season, a win at Carolina. Before that, he’s only yardage all season was 29 yards running on a fake punt Dec. 2 during Seattle’s win over Minnesota.
A 21-year-old rookie sixth-round pick going from exclusively special teams to starting, ahead of Marshawn Lynch, in a division-title game last weekend and a playoff game this weekend?
“Nah, man, I wasn’t expecting this,” Homer said.
“But, you know, you’ve just got to be ready for anything.”
Seahawks coaches knew when they took Homer in the next-to-last round of the draft in April he was a good third-down back at the University of Miami. He was skilled at catching the ball, running after the catch and pass blocking.
But Carroll, offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer and running backs coach Chad Morton did not know they were getting a relatively undersized, 5-foot-11, 202-pound attacker who runs something like Lynch does: to punish the guys trying to tackle him.
“I think that’s why we were excited about him because he’s a smaller guy. He’s just around 200 pounds,” Carroll said. “We liked everything we saw from him.
“I think the accent of his suddenness has really maybe jumped out a little bit more than I would’ve thought. I think It’s almost startling to see him hit it sometimes, so it’s pretty cool.”
Homer’s so aggressive trying to attack defenders, Carroll has had to tell him to back off a tad.
“He’s throwing his body at it about as much as a guy can do it,” the coach said. “When we had the two running backs hurt and he gets the next carry and he gets the ball going up the sidelines, he just crushed into the guys going out of bounds, I’m going, ‘Homer, no!’ Because he’s all we had.
“I told him, I said, ‘look, you have to pick your spots here because we don’t have any depth.’ He looked at me like, ‘There ain’t no way.’ He didn’t listen to a word I said. He was going to go downhill, and that’s the way he plays.
“I love it about him. Discretion isn’t really going to be one of his strengths.”
Ask Brian Schottenheimer what he thought of Homer’s first NFL start last weekend, and the offensive coordinator says: “Amazing,”
Homer is another example of how Carroll rewards special-teams players, of any age and experience, with playing time on offense and defense if they ball out on teams. Homer joins the tradition of Doug Baldwin, Jermaine Kearse, DeShawn Shead and others who have gone from special-teamers to starters and Super Bowl stars on offense and defense during Carroll’s decade as Seattle’s coach.
“Yeah, that’s where the indicators have come from,” Carroll said. “He ran a little bit in preseason and all that. I can’t say it enough how he has been so consistent since the day he stepped on the field for us. This is all we’ve ever seen of the guy.
“The special teams has given him the confidence. He runs the punt team, which is a big responsibility for a first-year guy to have. That’s because he’s so diligent and confident and special in his manner.
“Everything is just pointing to the positive.”
Asked what he believes his performance on special teams all season showed Carroll and his staff, Homer chuckled.
“Hopefully,” he said through the laugh, “I proved to them that they can trust me a little bit.”
This story was originally published January 2, 2020 at 7:18 AM.
