With he and his Seahawks reeling, Russell Wilson sends a message to the doubters
Russell Wilson just got celebrity “drafted” by the Harlem Globetrotters, joining previously so honored Lionel Messi, Neymar Jr., Usain Bolt, Mariano Rivera, Kevin Hart and Mahershala Ali.
“Probably the worst draft pick they’ve ever had,” he joked, laughing.
But after three three losses in four games and his alarming 10 turnovers in that span, after his first consecutive games with multiple interceptions since early in his rookie season eight years ago, the Seahawks’ quarterback is more baseball player—or boxer—than basketball player right now.
“I’m an overcomer,” Seattle’s only Super Bowl-champion quarterback and the NFL’s co-record holder for most wins to begin a career said.
Wilson had characteristic resolve in his voice.
“I’ve been doubted before,” he said. “I’m going to keep swinging.”
He’s been getting punched, and hard, lately, knocked down an alarming 34 times the last two weeks. And now the current heavyweights in the NFC West are coming to Seattle for a pivotal division game Thursday night: the Arizona Cardinals (6-3).
On Oct. 25 in Arizona the Cardinals sacked Wilson twice and hit him nine other times while blitzing him relentlessly. Wilson threw three interceptions was during their rally from 10 points down with 3 minutes left in regulation to beat the Seahawks (6-3) in overtime.
The Bills did the same thing to Wilson just outside Buffalo two weeks ago. They hit him 16 times (five sacks and 11 QB hits, the most against a quarterback in the NFL this season to that point). Wilson turned the ball over four times in the Bills’ 44-34 win.
Last weekend in California the Rams hit Wilson even more than that. They blitzed Wilson into six sacks and 12 more hits, 18 knockdowns. Wilson committed three more turnovers. The Rams held the NFL’s highest-scoring offense to 16 points (half Seattle’s season average). Los Angeles won by seven to move ahead of the Seahawks into second place in division on tiebreakers.
The Seahawks need to beat the Cardinals Thursday night to return to the division lead, avoid falling into third place with six games left—and to keep Wilson from his first three-game losing streak in the NFL.
His co-captain and co-franchise cornerstone believes in Wilson. Though not as much as Wilson believes in himself.
No one does.
“The number-one thing is his belief,” Seahawks All-Pro linebacker Bobby Wagner, Wilson’s 2012 draft classmate, said.
“His confidence is unshakable.”
Wilson or bust
For all of Seattle’s many issues with its last-ranked total and passing defense—injuries in the secondary, lack of pressure by the line—this team wins when Wilson is perfect, or nearly so. It loses when he’s not.
Wilson began this season with 19 touchdown passes and three interceptions through five games, when lead back Chris Carson was healthy and playing and his five starting offensive linemen were intact. The Seahawks were 5-0 last month, atop the NFC with the best start to a season in franchise history.
Wilson has thrown for nine touchdowns with seven interceptions the last four games. Three of those are Seattle’s only losses this season. Carson has missed those games. Left guard Mike Iupati did, too. Center Ethan Pocic missed last weekend’s loss at the Rams.
With seven games still left, Wilson is already one short of his career high of 11 interceptions in a season, from 2016 and ‘17. Entering 2020 he’d lost just 27% of his career fumbles (20 of 74). This season he’s lost three of four.
Two of his lost fumbles in 2020 were on sacks at Buffalo. One last weekend came when Wilson couldn’t recover a low, shotgun snap from fill-in center Kyle Fuller before the Rams did.
The first of his two interceptions at L.A. told Wilson’s play caller he was thinking too much. It was baffling, among his worst decisions in recent seasons.
His defense had finally come up with a huge turnover it desperately needed to slow down the Rams, who gained 275 yards and led 17-7 in their often-runaway first half.
Given the ball at the Rams’ 27-yard line, Wilson scrambled up the middle after dropping to pass. He had only one, distant defender between him, open field and the goal line. Instead he threw wildly across his body to the deep left, where three defensive backs were massed. Wilson was trying to throw to tight end Will Dissly, who had broken open earlier along the left sideline of the end zone. Rams cornerback Darious Williams moved over, jumped and rather easily intercepted the lofted gift of a throw for Wilson’s ninth interception this season.
After that loss, Wilson’s coach gave a rare, public rebuke of his quarterback’s decision-making and carelessness.
Of Wilson’s interception into the end zone when he had 10 yards of open field in front of him and perhaps a touchdown in the first half against the Rams, Carroll said: “When we get the big turnover, we get a chance to make some real noise in this game, we turn it right back at ‘em. Made a real big mistake there.
“With all of the emphasis that we have on it, to turn the ball over—what’s it, seven times in the last two weeks?—is just...I don’t even recognize that kind of execution where we are giving the ball up.”
Offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer cited that latest end-zone interception as proof Wilson is thinking too much, of “trying to process everything.”
“The number-one thing to say is: we completely trust Russ. Russ will get through this,” Schottenheimer said.
“But the one thing we did talk about was, just simplify your thinking. You know, there’s a lot of things that go through quarterbacks’ minds. That’s why you see these unbelievable performers have good games and bad games. ...
“Simplifying your thought process of your progressions...if this happens and there’s a break, OK, and there’s a chance for me to run and go make a bunch of yards, do that. Don’t try to throw the ball back across the field and find Diss.
“That’s been the number-one thing.”
Tuesday, Wilson acknowledged “I’ve got to make better decisions.”
And that’s it. He said he doesn’t want to over-think it.
Over-think all the mistakes, that is. He is all into resuming his thinking about the positive. Of maintaining the belief, the faith in his process, in his neutral mind.
In himself.
“It’s easy to doubt when you lose a game or lose a moment. That’s the easy thing to do,” Wilson said.
“The challenging thing, as a player, as an individual—anything in life, really—when you go through tough times, how do you keep believing? How do you keep getting back in alignment with all that?
“For us, just knowing who we are—I know, for me, in particular, continue to have great language and know who I am and what I’ve done—continue to believe in that.”
The former minor-league middle infielder for the Class-A Tri-City Dust Devils before the Seahawks drafted him into the NFL in 2012 says if you ask any baseball player about three straight 0-for-4 games.
“Next thing you know is, ‘How did I get to 0 for 12?’” he said.
“But what are you going to do? Do you not go up and quit swinging? I think that’s the thing. I think great players, great hitters, great shooters, great golfers, great quarterbacks, they find a way to get back out of it.
“That’s just the belief. That’s just the mentality. I look forward to it. I look forward to the adversity. I always have. I always will.
“I look forward to overcoming it all, and us getting back on track.”
What’s Schottenheimer seen in his QB this week?
“Motivated. Anxious to get back out and compete. Non-stop worker, wanting to be coached hard, wanting to be told, ‘Hey, this needs to get corrected.’...
“All those things that you would expect from an unbelievable champion and unbelievable competitor.”
His last 3-game losing streak
It was in 2009. Wilson was in his next-to-last year quarterbacking North Carolina State then.
When asked Tuesday if he’d ever lost three in a row, Wilson didn’t recall that N.C. State season 11 years ago. Wake Forest, Duke, Boston College and Florida State beat Wilson in consecutive October games.
“I don’t ever think about that...I don’t ever think that way,” he said.
Wilson got replaced by Mike Glennon in two of those four straight losses for North Carolina State in 2009.
Two years later, Wilson graduated from N.C. State, in three years. That left him with a fourth year of eligibility, his senior baseball season. In the spring of 2011 Wilson was coming off leading the Atlantic Coast Conference with 3,563 yards passing and 28 touchdowns as a junior. N.C. State went 9-4 and won a bowl game. But Wolfpack football coach Tom O’Brien had Glennon, a prized quarterback recruit, about to enter his junior year.
Wilson had been a fourth-round choice in the 2010 Major League Baseball draft by the Colorado Rockies. He played the summer of 2010 for Class-A Tri-City, a Rockies Class-A affiliate in eastern Washington. He wanted to go to spring training with the Rockies, which would conflict with N.C. State spring football practices.
“Basically, the coach at the time (at N.C. State) told me to transfer, told me to go play baseball (that I had to NFL future),” Wilson said in 2018 of O’Brien.
“I didn’t want to do that yet.”
So Wilson transferred to Wisconsin. He learned the Badgers’ offense in 21 days over the summer then led them to the Rose Bowl.
O’Brien’s choice is infamous in Carolina—and more fuel for Wilson when he talks about how he’s been doubted.
Glennon is an NFL journeyman. N.C. State went 8-5 and 7-6 in its two seasons with Glennon as its QB, including 4-4 in the ACC each year. Glennon is an NFL journeyman. He is a backup with the Jacksonville Jaguars and has 22 starts in a pro career that began in 2013 with Tampa Bay. He’s been with four teams since 2017.
Wilson is a $140 million superstar, in football and beyond. He is tied with Peyton Manning for the most wins by an NFL quarterback in the first nine regular seasons of a career (92).
He plays on passing Manning for that NFL record Thursday night.
“Every week has its own history,” Wilson said.
“We will get back to playing our best.”
