NFL all-decade team has 4 Seahawks players, plus Pete Carroll. But where’s Kam Chancellor?
Makes sense the Seahawks’ best decade in franchise history is also their most-acclaimed one.
The NFL and Pro Football Hall of Fame announced their all-decade team for the 2010s on Monday. Four Seahawks players plus coach Pete Carroll are on it.
Running back Marshawn Lynch joins All-Pros Bobby Wagner, Richard Sherman and Earl Thomas as selected by the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s 48-member selection committee.
To be eligible for the all-decade team a player must have had at least one Pro Bowl section, one All-Pro selection or been on a Pro Football Writers Association all-conference team from 2010-19.
The Seahawks and New England Patriots, the only teams to play in consecutive Super Bowls in the decade, were the only teams with four players that spent the majority of the decade with that club to make the 2010s all-decade list.
New England having Tom Brady selected at the loaded quarterback position is why Russell Wilson isn’t on this all-decade team. Brady is the only quarterback to make two all-decade teams.
Wilson, the face of the Seahawks franchise that made eight of 10 postseasons in the 2010s, made six Pro Bowls from 2012-19. He became the winningest QB in the first seven seasons of a career. Wilson joined Lynch, Wagner, Sherman and Thomas in leading to Seattle to its only Super Bowl title at the end of the 2013 season.
Not to be parochial, but Eric Weddle over Kam Chancellor as the third safety on the all-decade team is a stretch of the imagination.
Yes, Weddle was an All-Pro and was selected to six Pro Bowls to Chancellor’s four in the decade. But even the players that get them know those votes are largely popularity contests. Weddle did not redefine the strong-safety position with a uniquely ferocious style that Chancellor did in Seattle, until a neck injury forced him to retire after the 2017 season. Offenses had to play Chancellor as much as the Seahawks’ defense for much of the decade. Can’t say the same for Weddle—or any other strong safety in the 2010s.
Two predecessors at The News Tribune put it perfectly.
Carroll joins New England’s Bill Belichick as the coaches on the all-decade team. Belichick was on the 2000s all-decade team, too.
Carroll spoke last week on a conference call to reporters preceding the announcement he had made this all-decade team. He talked about his decision to pass from the 1-yard line in the final seconds of Super Bowl 49 instead of handing the ball to Lynch. No need to remind you that Malcolm Butler intercepted Wilson’s throw at the goal line to give the Patriots the NFL title instead of a second consecutive one for Seattle.
“It was such an emotional way to lose for everybody, and we had to rebuild everybody’s brain,” Carroll said. “We just bludgeoned our way through that. I tried to just make sure that I was unwavering. So, that was the challenge: To allow for the grieving and all of that, and then see what the issues were, and then put it back together. Yeah, that was hard. It was a hard challenge. It was really hard on some players. And some of us will never get over it.”
Yet the Seahawks have made the playoffs in four the five seasons since that unforgettable decision and defeat.
“I would say this to you: knowing the pain of that and the discomfort of that helps me, in a sense,” Carroll said. “It always has. It’s like, I’ve got a few things that have happened in the past that make me what I am and make me do what I do and hold the edge and fight to be what I’m capable of being, and that was one of those moments.
“It’s a challenge. That’s what it does: it challenges your approach and your philosophy and your guts and all that. And that’s good -- it’s a good thing. It’s what makes you stronger. And I don’t ever want to lose and learn; let the other guys learn the hard way. But when you’ve got that situation, it’s how you deal with it.”
The 53 men on the 2010 all-decade team, as selected by the 48 voting members for the Pro Football Hall of Fame:
Offense
WR – Antonio Brown, Larry Fitzgerald, Calvin Johnson, Julio Jones
TE – Rob Gronkowski, Travis Kelce
T – Jason Peters, Tyron Smith, Joe Staley, Joe Thomas
G – Jahri Evans, Logan Mankins, Zack Martin, Marshal Yanda
C – Alex Mack, Maurkice Pouncey
QB – Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers
RB – Frank Gore, Marshawn Lynch, LeSean McCoy, Adrian Peterson
Flex – Darren Sproles
Defense
DE – Calais Campbell, Cameron Jordan, Julius Peppers, J.J. Watt
DT – Geno Atkins, Fletcher Cox, Aaron Donald, Ndamukong Suh
LB – Chandler Jones, Luke Kuechly, Khalil Mack, Von Miller, Bobby Wagner, Patrick Willis
CB – Patrick Peterson, Darrelle Revis, Richard Sherman
S – Eric Berry, Earl Thomas, Eric Weddle
DB – Chris Harris, Tyrann Mathieu
Special Teams
P – Johnny Hekker, Shane Lechler
K – Stephen Gostkowski, Justin Tucker
PR – Tyreek Hill, Darren Sproles
KR – Devin Hester, Cordarrelle Patterson
Coaches
Bill Belichick, Pete Carroll
This story was originally published April 6, 2020 at 10:53 AM.
