K.J. Wright said Kyle Juszczyk had it coming, his latest huge play in his Seahawks year 10
K.J. Wright says the best fullback in the NFL had it comin’.
The Seahawks’ veteran linebacker is an uncle and big brother to his 52 teammates. Every one of them hasn’t been on the team as long as he has. Wright’s mild-mannered. Paternal, almost. He rarely has it out for anyone.
Yet last weekend in Seattle’s regular-season finale against San Francisco, Wright righted what he’s seen as a wrong. It was with 49ers five-time Pro Bowl fullback extraordinaire Kyle Juszczyk.
“I tell him every time we are out there, ‘Bro, please stop cutting me. Stop cutting me on these unnecessary plays,’” Wright said Tuesday of his NFC West rival.
“Cutting” means cut-blocking the linebacker, using a low, shoulder and body block into Wright’s knees. Defenders at every level from Pop Warner to the Pittsburgh Steelers hate getting cut blocked. Especially in the open field.
They absolutely, especially hate getting cut blocked when the play has gone to the opposite side of the field.
“’The ball is way over there...,’” Wright said.
He pointed and looked far away, to his right.
“’...there’s no need to come out and cut me.’
“I knew if I had a chance to get him—in a nice, clean shot—that I would take my shot,” Wright said.
He got that chance with 3 minutes left in the second quarter of the Seahawks’ win over the 49ers in Arizona on Sunday.
And, oh, yeah, he definitely took his shot. His best one.
With Seattle leading 6-0, San Francisco’s C.J. Beathard threw a check-down pass on second and 12 to Juszczyk, underneath the Seahawks’ deep-dropping coverage. Wright saw the play developing to his left, about 5 yards in front of and inside his zone responsibility outside.
The 31-year-old Wright ran at the unsuspecting Juszczyk like a 5-year-old does out of bed and down the stairs on Christmas morning. The longest-tenured Seahawk lowered his right shoulder into the fullback’s chest. The ferocity of Wright’s blow knocked the rugged, 236-pound fullback off his feet. Instantly, Juszczyk fell back. It looked like he was taking a Nestea-plunge free fall back into a swimming pool.
Juszczyk landed with a thud one could hear throughout the empty stadium in Arizona deserted by COVID-19 restrictions. Wright then uncharacteristically stood over his fallen foe. He glared down at Juszczyk. Teammate Bobby Wagner, Wright’s best friend on the Seahawks, ran over to the scene and jumped up and down to celebrate the hit. That added to the spectacle that was humorous—as long as you weren’t Juszczyk.
Wagner’s repeated “Whooo!” and howls of joy over Wright’s hit could be heard in the press box two levels above. Juszczyk, his pride crushed almost as much as he was, got to his feet and came at Wright.
“I just knew it was gonna be a big hit. I just didn’t know how big of a hit,” Wagner said. “It was so big I just had like a front row seat of watching him hit him as hard as he did.
“And then for some reason, Juszczyk got up talking trash, as if he made the hit.
“It was just a fun, fun moment.
“And he’s been great,” Wagner said, again, of Wright.
Two days later, talking about his hit, Wright just shrugged.
“Had to make it happen,” he said.
Wright said all is well between him and the 49ers’ star fullback, who paid dearly for his 10th catch in nine career games against the Seahawks.
“We cool,” Wright said. “Yeah, like, I talk to him all the time.
“But during that play he just...he...
“He asked for it.”
(Another) standout year
The obliteration of Juszczyk was another in a season full of huge plays Wright’s made this season. The outside linebacker Seattle drafted in the fourth round in 2011 out of Mississippi State has reasserted how valuable he is to the Seahawks’ defense.
Wright’s one of the more decorated players in franchise history. Eleven seasons as a starter, including at all three linebacker spots in coach Pete Carroll’s 4-3 defense. A Super Bowl champion as a star on the only Seattle team to win the NFL title, the 2013 squad. A Pro Bowl selection that most around the league saw as long overdue in 2016.
Saturday’s NFC wild-card playoff game against the Los Angeles Rams at Lumen Field will be Wright’s 14th playoff start. That is the second-most in franchise history, one behind Wagner and quarterback Russell Wilson. The Seahawks drafted Wagner and Wilson the year after Wright had already become a starter, as a rookie.
“K.J. is...”
Defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. then paused. The three-time Super Bowl-champion linebacker and former All-Pro with the 49ers and Dallas Cowboys shook his head.
“You know, there so many things that you can coach. There are a lot of things you can’t coach,” Norton said. “There are so many things that can rely on him to cover you on the field. He makes everyone else around him on the field better. Everyone understands his football IQ. He’s a gym rat when it comes to ball; he is always watching film. Always asking questions. Always wants to know why.”
Norton still marvels at how expertly and effortlessly Wright started at middle linebacker for injured Lofa Tatupu. He was better than and started over third-year first-round pick Aaron Curry at strongside “Sam” linebacker. He then took Leroy Hill’s starting job at weakside, “Will” linebacker—all in Wright’s rookie season of 2011.
It’s skill. It’s intellect. It’s precision.
Wright, in the final year of his two-year contract that was only guaranteed for one before the 2019 season, still has more of all that than most NFL players.
Norton was Wright’s linebackers coach for the Seahawks in 2011. He knows Wright better than any coach Wright’s ever had. Norton says during games he and Wagner often need only a word or two or even just a look or head nod, and Wright gets what his coach and his All-Pro signal caller need. His play recognition, particularly his penchant from quickly diagnosing screen passes and destroying them, is legendary inside the Seahawks locker room and renowned around the league.
Years ago, his teammates nicknamed Wright “The Screenmaster.”
The Rams are one of the league’s best at throwing to running backs, particularly on screens.
Paging Seattle’s number 50. Again.
“It’s very rare that you will get a screen off to 50’s side of the field,” Wagner said.
Switch in year 10
This season, after 10 years with Wright as their starting weakside linebacker, the Seahawks needed him to move to strongside. Bruce Irvin tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee in September and needed season-ending surgery. Jordyn Brooks, the team’s rookie first-round pick, has the speed and future that will make him Seattle’s weakside backer for years.
Norton didn’t tell but asked Wright, for his approval to change from off-the-ball linebacker in space to on-the-field, blasting into tight ends and tackles and becoming more like a defensive end. At age 31. After a decade in another job.
Though Norton has downplayed it, Wright describes the discussion as more like a fight with the son of the former heavyweight champion of the world.
Let’s just say Wright wasn’t thrilled with being asked to move.
Asked Tuesday how many times Wright said “Hell, no!” to Norton for proposing the position change, the coach laughed.
“No, K.J. doesn’t talk like that,” Norton said.
“He has other words that mean that.
“Fortunate—or, I’m not sure if it’s unfortunate—K.J. and I have a really strong and close relationship,” Norton said. “So it was more than just one conversation. It’s like talking to your closest family member, and having to break the news, and then having him to agree to it.
“K.J. is the type of guy that he demands a lot of respect for what he’s been able to do over the years at such a high level, and he wanted to make sure that respect was given. And at the same time (relay) that he’s a team guy and he’ll do whatever it takes for the team.
“But he needed to feel the respect, and then what he needed to do to make the team better.”
He has.
Wright’s had one of the best seasons. Against Minnesota in October he showed the speed and athleticism of a 21-year-old racing back, leaping and intercepting a pass from startling Kirk Cousins to a wide receiver outside to spark Seattle’s comeback win. He also recovered a fumble in that game.
The Seahawks transformed since allowing the most yards and most yards passing through seven games, and giving up 44 points at Buffalo in November to set a record for a Carroll defense in Seattle. They are now shutdown unit. The defense is why the Seahawks won the NFC West. Seattle allowed 15 points per game the last seven games. That tied for fewest surrendered in the NFL.
Now his contract is about to end. Wright was thinking some before this season this might be his final one. His goal had always been to play 10 years for the same team, and he’s gone one season past that—splendidly. It’s been obvious hearing Wright talk proudly about his performance the last month and a half that he believes he can still play in 2021 and beyond.
He wants it to be in Seattle. Will it be?
Irvin will be coming back from his knee surgery. Carroll has called him his prototype in size, speed and attitude for the strongside linebacker. But he’s older than Wright, at 33. Irvin’s only on a one-year contract that is expiring when this season ends. Brooks has excelled as he’s been healthier and learned the defense the latter half of this season at Wright’s old weakside spot.
It’s clear what Wagner and Norton think.
“I think he means everything to our team, to the organization, to the community to this football family.”
Norton calls Wright “a coach’s dream.”
“He’s certainly a guy who makes us all better,” Norton said.
“Special, special player.”
