Marshawn Lynch, part 3? He says his agent ‘has been in talks’ on a 2020 return to Seahawks
Is Marshawn Lynch coming back for more chicken?
The superpopular superstar running back has told ESPN television his agent Doug Hendrickson has been in touch with the Seahawks about possibly coming back to play for them for a third time in 2020.
“Well, it’s almost on that ‘expect the unexpected,’” the 34-year-old Lynch said late Monday night when SportsCenter host Scott Van Pelt asked about his future. “But, I mean, you know, just as far as right now, what I do know is, Imma keep it solid like this: My agent has been in talks with Seattle. So like I said, we’ll see what happens.
“If it works out, you know what I mean, and I get back up there, it is what it is. And, I mean, if not, s***, I’m lookin’ good.
“So I ain’t really trippin’ too much.”
As usual.
Lynch is an unsigned free agent with, up to now, unclear intentions on playing or not in 2020. Hendrickson, Lynch’s Bay Area-based agent, has negotiated with Seattle general manager John Schneider regularly for the last decade.
Schneider and coach Pete Carroll have said multiple times this offseason when asked about Lynch’s future with the team verbatim and variations of “We’ll see” and “you never know.”
With Lynch, no one does.
The Seahawks are in the same situation they were when Lynch returned to play for them this past December: in need of veteran running-back depth because of injuries. Chris Carson is returning from a season-ending hip injury from late last season. Rashaad Penny had reconstructive knee surgery 5 1/2 months ago. Oft-injured C.J. Prosise’s rookie contract expired; he is an unsigned free agent.
Two weeks ago the Seahawks drafted running back DeeJay Dallas from Miami in the fourth round.
The only running back on the 90-man offseason roster who has carried the ball in an NFL regular-season game? Travis Homer. The Seahawks’ sixth-round draft choice last year, also from the University of Miami, has one more career start than you do: Dec. 29 in Seattle’s 2019 regular-season finale.
That was six days after Lynch returned from of a 14-month hiatus from football to sign back with the Seahawks, for the final regular-season game of last year then both of Seattle’s playoff games. He signed eight days after he was passing out tequila shots in the parking lot of the Oakland Coliseum before a hometown Raiders game.
That was the Seahawks’ feel-good response to losing Carson, Penny and Prosise.
They still don’t have them back, though Carson is expected to play in the 2020 opener. That’s whenever the COVID-19 virus outbreak subsides enough for a season to begin. Carroll said in February it’s possible if not likely Penny begins training camp on the physically-unable-to-perform list. That would put the 2018 first-round pick in line to possibly miss the first six games of the season.
An obvious question to exploring whether Lynch wants to and will play for the Seahawks again this year: when would he show up? He famously skipped voluntary offseason workouts when he was Seattle’s lead back from 2010-15. He didn’t play in preseason games. Would he, at age 34, want to play in relatively grinding, early-season games in September and October?
Coach Pete Carroll acknowledged with a laugh in January that Lynch is, in fact, the only guy in the universe the Seahawks would be willing to flex for with another special, late- and partial-season contract.
“I think that’s a good way to phrase that,” he said four months ago, continuing to chuckle.
“That’s awesome.”
Lynch wowed his new Seahawks teammates upon his return two days before Christmas. Almost all 53 of them had not played with him before; K.J. Wright, Bobby Wagner and Russell Wilson particularly heralded the return of the soul to the Seahawks’ consecutive Super Bowl teams in the 2013 and ‘14 seasons.
Lynch scored a touchdown six days after he returned, in Seattle’s 2019 regular-season finale against San Francisco. Then he rushed for three short-yardage touchdowns in the Seahawks’ wild-card playoff win at Philadelphia and the divisional-round loss at Green Bay. He totaled 30 carries for 67 yards and the four scores in his first three Seahawks games since January 2016.
After that playoff loss to the Packers, Lynch came into a press-conference room outside the Seahawks’ locker room at Lambeau Field—a rarity for him.
When asked that January night in Wisconsin whether he would talk to the Seahawks about playing again in 2020, Lynch said: “I’m pretty sure we’ll see what’s hangin’”
Then Lynch gave a speech directed at younger players in Seattle and across the league. He told them to “take care of y’all chicken.”
The advice sounded like a second retirement announcement from the NFL. But with Lynch, as he said aptly Monday night: “it’s almost on that ‘expect the unexpected.’”
Three weeks after the 2015 season, his sixth Seattle season, ended he famously posted a picture of his green game cleats hanging from a telephone wire as a retirement announcement—during Super Bowl 50 in February 2016.
During our coronavirus pandemic, Lynch has been, among other things, riding on a cart passing out masks with his Beast Mode brand logo on them to people around Lake Merritt in Oakland.
This story was originally published May 4, 2020 at 10:43 PM.
