Seahawks camp day 4: Now it’s rookie Kenny McIntosh’s time; Bobby Wagner not looking 33
Kenny McIntosh was angry, excited and slighted he didn’t get picked until the last round of the NFL draft.
So much so, he was crying, overcome with emotion, after the Seahawks finally picked him.
“(Shoot), man, I’ve been waiting all day,” McIntosh said, crying through the telephone, of a Saturday this May that began with the fourth round at noon his Eastern Time before he got drafted at about 6:30 p.m. “How do you think it feels?
“I wasn’t expecting this, honestly.
“C’mon, let’s do it. ... I’m lit.”
Almost undrafted, it’s all bright for McIntosh now.
Before even his first full week in an NFL training camp, he’s starting for the Seahawks. You know, the team whose 71-year-old coach Pete Carroll is seen as a throwback for wanting to run the ball. The team that can’t have enough running backs.
An overlooked, seventh-round pick from national college football-champion Georgia, McIntosh suddenly finds himself splitting first-team handoffs with veteran DeeJay Dallas from Seattle Pro Bowl quarterback Geno Smith.
McIntosh’s opportunity has come because lead back Kenneth Walker, coming off a 1,050-yard rookie season, and rookie second-round pick Zach Charbonnet are both out indefinitely with a groin and shoulder injuries, respectively.
Carroll announced that Sunday, the fourth day of training camp.
Walker hasn’t practiced since the first day of camp Wednesday. He’s missed three practices and counting.
Charbonnet was seeing doctors Sunday, his second consecutive missed practice day.
Carroll also announced this was a “very important week or two” for Dallas, whom the Seahawks coaches and teammates know — and especially for McIntosh, whom they don’t.
Because of injury at the sport’s most injured position with its shortest career length, opportunity is not knocking but pounding at McIntosh’s door entering the first full-pads practices of camp Monday and Tuesday.
So far, four practices in, McIntosh is standing out. He had two more long runs speeding past defenders in 11-on-11 scrimmaging against the first- and second-team defenses Sunday.
“Kenny Mac, he’s been, probably, one of the highlights,” Carroll said. “(Even) when everybody was here, he was one of the highlighted players.
“He looks really quick. We’ve commented, the coaches have commented, that we are surprised how quick he has looked.
“He’s 4.52 or three, or something like that (in his 40-yard dash). There’s a lot of good running backs who have run that time. So that’s not the issue. But he’s looked quicker than he had in the spring time, that’s all I can tell you. Everybody’s fired up about it.”
Carroll said the 6-foot McIntosh, listed at 204 pounds, lost 10 pounds in the six weeks from the end of the organized team activities and minicamp practices of May and June to the start of training camp.
Nothing gets rookies and unproven players in Carroll’s better graces than showing up for camp in supreme physical condition, and not wasting those six weeks as he warns all each June.
So McIntosh helped himself even before Walker and Charbonnet got hurt.
“He’s in great shape,” Carroll said. “He’s just razor sharp. He’s been explosive and innovative with his runs and cuts. He’s caught the ball well. He’s done really well.
“DeeJay’s a little bigger than he’s been. I talked about it to him today. He’s about 230 right now (above his listed 214). I like him running with the power and being physical as a difference-kind of a guy for this. We are going to see how that works for him.”
How big of an opportunity is this for McIntosh?
The Walker and Charbonnet injuries leave Dallas, McIntosh, second-year free agent Bryant Koback and undrafted rookie Wayne Taulapapa (last season’s rushing leader at the University of Washington Seattle signed last week) as the only running backs in Seattle’s camp. Those four have played a combined 44 career regular-season games in the NFL. All 44 of those games are Dallas’. He’s been the Seahawks’ third-down back and special-teams mainstay the last three seasons.
McIntosh looks great so far. But the truest test to see if he can surpass Dallas on the depth chart will come in full pads this week.
That’s when he, his fellow backs plus Seattle’s offensive linemen and running backs will begin live pass-blocking drills against charging defensive linemen and linebackers also trying to make the team by getting past them. Running backs who pass block play for Carroll. Those who don’t play much less.
That’s why Dallas has been a third-down back for the Seahawks the last three seasons, his first three in the NFL.
“We know he can play,” Carroll said.
“Yeah, everybody sees (this) moment. They can see who lining up and who’s taking the reps, and all.
“It’s a really important week or two here for both he (Dallas) and Mac. So, we’re gaining a lot of information on them.
“We don’t need a lot on DeeJay. We know him. But for Kenny McIntosh, this is really important.”
Devon Witherspoon 2nd team
Devon Witherspoon seems to be paying a penance for his holdout.
Since signing his rookie contract and practicing for the first time Friday after missing the first two days of camp, the fifth-overall pick has been the second-team cornerback on the left side behind Tre Brown.
Brown had a sterling practice Sunday. He raced back into the deep center of the field to the back of the end zone to knock away Smith’s long pass to Tyler Lockett on a post route. In a seven-on-seven drill, the 5-foot-10 Brown leaped with 6-foot-4 tight end Will Dissly, tapped Smith’s pass to himself and intercepted the ball in the end zone. He also knocked away another pass.
“Oh, man, he had a great day,” Carroll said. “He was all over the place.”
Brown was Seattle’s second of three picks in the 2021 draft, in the fourth round from Oklahoma. He was asserting himself with three starts as a rookie before a serious knee injury required surgery in November 2021.
That recovery lasted into October 2022. By then, Michael Jackson had seized a starting job. At the opposite corner, Tariq Woolen was leading the NFL in interceptions on his way to the Pro Bowl as a rookie.
So Brown had no place to play.
Right now, he does. And he’s making the absolute most of it.
So is Jackson. He has been the starting right cornerback in this camp. Woolen remains on the physically-unable-to-perform list. He had arthroscopic knee surgery in May.
Jackson has been the best defensive player in the first four days of training camp. He has often covered DK Metcalf one on one, effectively walling him off in the end zone with his body for incomplete passes.
A four-year practice-squad player in the NFL before he got his chance to start last season, Jackson is relentless. He just refuses to yield, to anyone.
Bobby Wagner is movin’
Bobby Wagner hasn’t looked 33 years old so far in this camp.
Sunday, the 12-year veteran and six-time All-Pro went from his inside-linebacker spot out wide right to pick up Dallas in man coverage outside. He then ran with the running back 50 yards, to the goal line. Wagner covered Dallas so closely Smith’s pass to the running back hit Wagner in the back of the helmet and landed incomplete.
Wagner then woofed in Dallas’ face as defensive teammates ran over to them to pound Wagner on the helmet and back to celebrate the play.
Jaxon Smith-Njigba. Again.
Another day, another wowing play by rookie first-round pick Jaxon Smith-Njigba. He has been the offensive star of camp so far.
Sunday, the former Ohio State wide receiver who’s already won the third, slot receiver spot inside Metcalf and Lockett made a toe-dragging catch with his arms and hands extended on a Geno Smith pass to the back of the end zone. Smith-Njigba twisted his body between two defensive backs and snared the ball just inside Pro Bowl safety Quandre Diggs.
It was perhaps the best catch by anyone so far in camp.
Smith-Njigba is 21 years old.
Alternating center days
The Seahawks are alternating who starts at center each day.
Sunday it was rookie Olu Oluwatimi’s turn. Carroll said the impressive fifth-round pick from Michigan has wrist pain the team is managing.
Veteran Evan Brown started at center Friday, the previous practice before Saturday’s players day off.
“I’ve been really impressed with Evan,” Carroll said of the former Lions center and guard, who is 320 pounds at 6-4. “Big brute of a guy.”
Extra points
- Noah Fant passed his physical following offseason surgery on his right knee. He was a limited practice participant. He watched quarterbacks throw to fellow tight ends while holding his helmet. This is a contract year for the 25-year-old former first-round pick of the Denver Broncos, acquired in March 2022 in the Russell Wilson trade.
- Damien Lewis was sick Sunday, Carroll said. Jake Curhan was the starting left guard, with Phil Haynes becoming entrenched at the starter at right guard.
- Smith threw an interception in the end zone during a red-zone drill, when he held onto the ball for a long time and threw late over the middle to Lockett. Inside linebacker Devin Bush picked that off. The final play of practice, Diggs intercepted Smith when Metcalf kept running a seam route beyond the throw, as if the receiver thought it was going to be a much longer pass.
- Wagner hugged general manager John Schneider behind the offensive huddle while the reserves were scrimmaging late in practice.
- The first day of shoulder pads for practice is Monday.
This story was originally published July 31, 2023 at 5:00 AM.
