DK Metcalf runs a 10.36 100 at the Golden Games, will now head to Seahawks minicamp
DK Metcalf hung with some of the world’s greatest sprinters. He impressed a four-time Olympic sprint medalist.
And he learned track and football are completely different sports and talents.
The freakish, 6-foot-4, 230-pound Seahawks wide receiver with next-to-no body fat hulked over the other eight, far-more-lean sprinters Sunday in the starting blocks of his 100-meter heat at the USA Track & Field’s Golden Games in Walnut, California. Metcalf, his sculpted physique shown off by an all-black, Under Armor tank shirt and matching shorts, ran in the inside lane two of nine lanes.
Physically, he looked like a grown man among middle-schoolers.
At the starting gun he broke nearly even with Mike Rogers, the 36-year-old 100-meter specialist. Rogers had said this past week Metcalf and other football players who try to compete with elite track sprinters “have no clue.”
Metcalf looked like he possessed a clue or three as he stayed with Sunday’s 100-meter field through 40 meters. That’s the length he’s run many times training for the NFL combine a couple years ago.
As the race doubled that distance, the bigger Metcalf could not find a finishing speed the other eight sprinters all have honed through years of training and competitions. He hasn’t had any of those, not since Metcalf was in high school in Oxford, Mississippi. And even then he was a high-school hurdler, not a 100-meter sprinter.
Metcalf finished his heat Sunday in 10.36 seconds. It was ninth in the nine-man heat, steps behind the top five but not good enough to qualify for the Golden Games finals. It also was not good enough for his goal of qualifying for the U.S. Olympic Trials in Eugene, Oregon, next month.
“Man, just happy to be here. I just thank God for the opportunity to just come out here and run against world-class athletes like this,” Metcalf told NBC on the track after his race. “Just working out. Just to test my speed up against world-class athletes like this...just having the opportunity to run against these guys was just a blessing.”
Russell Wilson was watching, and impressed. Metcalf’s quarterback with the Seahawks posted on his Twitter account Sunday afternoon: “Amazing bro!” with three fire emojis.
Asked by NBC’s Lewis Johnson if he learned anything Sunday on the track, Metcalf said: “Oh, yes, sir. These are world-class athletes. They do (this) for a living. It’s very different from football speed—from what I just realized.”
How did Metcalf get to Sunday?
In October, Metcalf ran down Arizona safety Budda Baker across more than 100 yards, starting 10 yards behind him, to save a touchdown on an interception return in a Seahawks-Cardinals game.
After that feat, which coaches of all sports will be showing their athletes for decades, USA Track & Field basically dared Metcalf to run in one of its events.
“For everyone asking if we have a spot open on our relay team for @dkm14 , @NFL players are welcome to come test their speed against real speed next year at the Olympic Trials,” @usatf posted in its Twitter page in October.
Metcalf responded online with: “See you there.”
Asked by NBC’s Johnson after his heat why he did it, why he ran the 100 in the Golden Games against America’s best professional sprinters, Metcalf said: “Because I’m a football player and an athlete first. I’m a man of God.
“I just to things because I want to do it.”
By track-side accounts, Metcalf was impressive.
“He did a phenomenal job. Ten 3-6 for a man that size? ...He did not embarrass himself,” NBC track analyst Ato Boldon said on the network’s broadcast.
Boldon is a four-time Olympic medalist in the 100 and 200 meters from Trinidad.
“I did not think he would run anywhere near that well,” he said of Metcalf’s performance in the 100.
Before Metcalf’s race, Boldon said on the air he thought Metcalf would run 10.6 or 10.5 seconds.
It was widely believed Metcalf would need to run under 10.2 to qualify for the Olympic Trials.
In the first heat before Metcalf’s Sunday, the three automatic qualifiers for Sunday’s 100-meter final all ran a 10.17 or better.
The top three times in each of two heats and then the three best remaining times advanced to the finals later Sunday.
Asked by NBC’s Johnson if he was interested in running more track, Metcalf chuckled and said, “I’ve got minicamp” to do. That’s next month at Seahawks headquarters in Renton.
The October night Metcalf ran down the stunned Baker in Arizona, the 23-year-old receiver was timed at a top speed of 22.64 miles per hour. He covered 114.8 yards from the center of the field at one goal line, where Wilson threw an interception outside intended for running back Chris Carson, to the sideline down which Baker was cruising to the opposite goal line.
The average speed of the current world record in track;s 100 meters, Usain Bolt’s 9.58 seconds set in 2009, is 23.35 mph.
In the end, Metcalf proved he was no track gimmick. He’s an elite athlete at the top level of his profession—just not a world-class track sprinter.
He was better than Renaldo Nehemiah said Metcalf would be. This week, the former world-class hurdler then 1980s San Francisco 49er was quoted saying of Metcalf running the Golden Games 100: “They will destroy him.”
Metcalf didn’t win. Nesquik won’t be giving away free cases of Metcalf’s favorite strawberry milk, as the company had promised Friday to do if the Seahawk had qualified for the Olympic Trials.
But Metcalf was far from destroyed.
In at least one way, he’s a man before his time.
As The News Tribune’s Sean Robinson noted, Metcalf’s time Sunday would have been good enough for the gold medal in the 100 meters at the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles.
This story was originally published May 9, 2021 at 1:24 PM.
