‘Russ, I love you’: Will Ferrell surprise guest ‘player’ for Seahawks’ virtual training
“Russ, I love you. I mean, I LOVE you...let’s make a baby.”
That’s how Greg Ols...er, Will Ferrell, started his surprise appearance on the Seahawks’ players daily Zoom online call Thursday.
Russell Wilson laughed at that.
“Stepbrothers,” the Seahawks quarterback replied.
Seattle is in the first of three weeks of an NFL offseason program like no other. The coronavirus pandemic has closed all team facilities indefinitely, canceling organized team activities, minicamps and all on-field work. So the Seahawks’ official offseason training program is beginning virtually. More than 70 players per session are getting behind computer and smart-phone screens to hear their coaches assign training schedules and teach the basics of the playbook for 90 minutes each day.
Like everything else, Pete Carroll is using this unprecedented arrangement as another opportunity to compete. Seattle’s players-first coach says he wants to do Zoom calls better everyone else, too.
Enter Will Ferrell.
He is Carroll’s long-time pal, back to when the coach was leading USC and the actor-comedian would show up on the sidelines of Trojans’ practices and games in Los Angeles.
Wednesday, Carroll was beginning another one of his daily Zoom calls with the Seahawks. Wilson, All-Pro Bobby Wagner, offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr., all of them and more were on the call. Carroll told them he wanted to give one of the newest Seahawks a semi-formal, remote introduction to the team.
He then summoned into the call Pro Bowl veteran tight end Greg Olsen, whom Seattle signed this offseason, to the call.
Ferrell came on. He was wearing a Seahawks blue jersey with the number 12, black-rimmed eyeglasses and a cap on backwards. Tufts of gray hair were poking out the sides of the cap.
He looked like Larry David trying to be a Seahawk.
The players and coaches laughed at the sight, even before Ferrell—I mean, “Olsen”—started talking.
“What I did for Carolina is, I scripted my own plays. So I will be added a lot to the playbook,” he said.
“Remember, no max protection. Don’t stick me back there in max protection,” he said, still deadpan.
That was directed at Schottenheimer, the team’s play caller.
“Talk to Solari,” Schottenhimer replied, referring to Seahawks offensive-line coach Mike Solari.
“I think we’ve got a great tight-end group. The only thing I have to say is, Luke, you’ve got to tamp that (stuff) down,” Ferrell said to veteran Luke Willson, who has the team’s longest and most unruly, WWE-style hair.
“I don’t know what you do in the offseason up there in Canada, but cut your (bleep) damn hair and let’s play some football, all right?”
Ferrell then called out special-teams coach Brian Schneider.
“Coach Schneider, I just want to be clear, I want to let you know: I do not do special teams,” he said, to more laughs in the background.
“Not ever. Not if all 52 guys are hurt.”
Olsen did some television broadcasting of XFL games this spring. After his one-year deal with Seattle expires following the 2020 season it’s likely the 35-year-old’s next career will be commentating on games.
So Ferrell told Carroll he appreciated the coach allowing him to play while also broadcasting the Seahawks’ games this season, and thus he will only be participating in 12 plays per game.
“Look, I know what you are thinking. I’m an older guy. ...But I’ve been working out,” he said.
Then Ferrell stood up in front of his camera. He lifted his jersey to reveal a, um...less-than-professional-athlete-shaped midsection. He included a comically mushy side view, even.
“This is a yoga body,” he said.
Carroll in particular laughed at that.
“You might want to work on that core a little bit. It looked like it could use a little bit of work,” Carroll said.
Carroll said last week he and his staff had been working to find creative ways to keep the Seahawks players engaged during these virtual training sessions that will go on for another three weeks. The coach wants to gain a competitive edge over foes in this unprecedented offseason, through creativity.
“This is a chance to compete,” Carroll said on a different Zoom call, to the media, last week.
“This really is a competition. And we are up against trying to figure this thing out. I think that’s one of the really extraordinary parts of what this is all about for us, is trying to create the best avenues for communications that will allow us to free flow and really react the way we normally will and would like to. ...
“It’s exciting. This has been, it’s been an exciting challenge. We don’t know what’s going to happen, but we are trying to even it out and make sure that we do and we can operate really highly. ...
“We’re going to try to kick butt in this process, and maybe some other teams aren’t. We don’t know what they are going to go. We don’t have a clue what anybody else is doing. We are just doing this all on our own. We are battling and competing like always and going to try to make it come out really in a special way.”
Carroll said this offseason is perhaps his most challenging. He is so dependent on a hands-on, emotion-based connection with his players. That’s from the first day of every offseason through the final day of each season.
“It is different. It’s not the same,” he said. “You can feel that there’s a separation in there, that we are a very close group and we do communicate. It’s just a lot of inner workings and all that.
“It is going to be different in that regard and with the players, as well, and as we start to bring in new guys, it’s just going to take us I think longer in some regards. Yet I think we’ll get really good focus out of the guys on the interchanging.”
What will Carroll have for his guys next?
Don’t rule out a Snoop Dogg concert on a Seahawks Zoom call.
This story was originally published May 1, 2020 at 1:40 PM.
