Geno Smith’s accountability, its origins and its refreshing effect on the Seahawks
Jaxon Smith-Njigba being wide open for a likely touchdown that could have won the last game the Seahawks lost?
That, Geno Smith says, is on him.
“For sure, he was open. He should have gotten the ball. That would have given us the lead,” Seattle’s quarterback said Thursday, four days after the team blew four chances inside the red zone in the second half of its 17-13 loss at Cincinnati.
“Like I said, that was one of the mistakes that I made in the game, which was a few of them — which was a few too many. ...
“I’m being honest. I put that right on me. Because everyone else did their job. I just failed to do mine.”
His second of two interceptions last weekend against the Bengals? The one when receiver DK Metcalf stopped running his in-breaking route because Cincinnati cornerback Cam Taylor-Britt read it and was running it ahead of him?
Metcalf said it was his fault. Smith said after the game that was all his, Smith’s, fault.
In a profession where mistakes are typically explained while being couched with “we” — including by the man who preceded him as Seattle’s QB — Smith majors in “I.”
He is showing the Seahawks and Seattle this week he is directly accountable. To himself.
While Smith won’t say it, it’s refreshing and appreciated by his teammates to see and hear their captain taking all blame for all team failures.
“I’m just being honest,” Smith said. “When I’m up here speaking or when I’m always talking to you guys, I’m really being honest with how I feel. ...
“Anytime you get the ball in your hands, fourth quarter, 2-minute drive, with the chance to go and take the lead — which we did, we had that opportunity — those are moments I live for. I look forward to those opportunities. I feel like when the ball is in my hands, when the ball is in the offense’s hands, and we have the chance to go take the game, that’s what we need to do.
“When it doesn’t happen, I always look at myself and say: What do I need to do better? As one of the leaders on this team, it’s always going to be on me and not anyone else. I always put it on my shoulders.”
Coach Pete Carroll says he’s “not worried...at all” about the two interceptions — twice Smith’s season total entering the Cincinnati game — or the four sacks and the two fourth-down plays late inside the Bengals’ 10-yard line on which Smith failed to get off a throw. Carroll cites the many problems in pass protection Seattle had on the offensive line last weekend: two fill-in starters, three blockers playing hurt.
The Seahawks’ coach believes Cincinnati was a one-off. He believes Smith’s mentality and approach will lead to him and the team to resuming winning performances.
Carroll cherishes Smith taking personal responsibility for the loss to the Bengals.
“It’s a perfect illustration of leadership. That’s exactly what guys should do,” the coach said. “If that’s how they feel about it, then they express it that way. The example that they display for other players is exceedingly valuable for us. So you don’t spend time trying to deny what just happened, you get after it and you figure it out and you get right and you get better for it.
“I thought Geno did a perfect job of that.”
Sending a message to teammates
Smith has an idea of the message he’s sending to his teammates when he owns losses as he did in Cincinnati.
“Hopefully, accountability,” he said.
“Like I said, I’m always trying to find ways to get better and improve. I felt like this past weekend, this last game, wasn’t my best game. I felt like I could have done a lot of things better. And I’m not going to back down from that.
“I’m a human being. I’m not perfect, make a lot of mistakes. But I am working on correcting those. I am never going to back down from those challenges. In fact, I look forward to the next opportunity to correct some of those things.”
That’s Sunday. The Seahawks (3-2) host the Arizona Cardinals (1-5) in an NFC West game at Lumen Field (1:05 p.m., channel 13).
It’s inherent for his position, of course, to take responsibility. He has the ball in his hands each play. Plus, he’s getting paid big money that carries with it larger responsibility for the team’s fortunes.
He received a $105 million, three-year contract this spring from Seattle. Then his teammates voted him as captain for the first time. That was after he set four franchise passing records, made his first career postseason start and his first Pro Bowl replacing Russell Wilson last season.
“I think in life, that’s the way I view life overall. Not just in sports, overall in life, it’s great to be accountable,” Smith said.
“I think it’ll help everybody out just being more accountable.”
The source of Geno Smith’s accountability
He’s 33. He’s been hardened by his experience of starting as a rookie in New York 11 seasons ago, then losing his job when a Jets teammate sucker-punched him in the locker room and broke his jaw over money allegedly owed.
He sat on benches of four teams for seven years on a series of minimum, one-year contracts. That included three years almost never playing behind Wilson with these Seahawks.
Then, last year after Seattle traded Wilson to Denver, Smith finally got his chance.
But those experiences are not why he’s this noticeably accountable.
It’s more fundamental for him than that.
Smith’s mother, Tracey Sellers, and his grandmother, Joann Smith, instilled the virtues of accountability and of selflessness in him as he grew up in Miami.
When Smith was at Miramar High School, his grandmother founded the Parenting with a Purpose Life Center in Miami Lakes. The nonprofit organization offers free pregnancy tests, lifestyle counseling, educational training, community referral services and other resources to predominantly single, younger parents.
His mother is also active with Extended Hands, a second Miami Lakes social-services organization. It began in 2010 for low-resourced communities in Dade County.
“It really started with my grandmother,” he said last winter. “She didn’t make the most money, and worked at a cafeteria.”
That was inside Bunche Park Elementary School in Opa-locka.
“We grew up in Miami, Florida, where it wasn’t always the best place as far as financial status,” Smith said last year. “But my grandmother would come back home from school and tell me stories about how some of the kids might have come to school hungry or were going home and didn’t have food at home. She would either take food from our house and bring it to them or she would give food from the cafeteria for them to take home. She would give them extra lunch and things like that.”
Those stories stayed with Smith. Stayed with him from youth football quarterbacking the Miami Gardens Chargers Optimist team. To Miramar High. To starring at West Virginia University. Through becoming a second-round NFL draft choice in 2013 and now an 11-year veteran in the league.
“I’m a perfectionist at heart,” he said Thursday. “I’ve always been that way.
“I don’t see it as hard or anything like that.”
He chuckled.
“It’s not hard to be accountable. That’s who I am. That’s how I was raised,” he said.
“My upbringing, in my household, you had to be accountable. And I just took it to life.”
This story was originally published October 19, 2023 at 3:12 PM.
