By Mike Vorel, The Seattle Times
SEATTLE — Mike Macdonald set the path to this point.
On Wednesday, the Seahawks posted a video of Macdonald’s first team meeting on social media. It was April 8, 2024, and the fresh-faced 36-year-old coach faced the cast he inherited from Pete Carroll. He faced a team with a frustratingly fixed ceiling, and a single playoff win in the previous seven years. He faced the weight of enormous opportunity, the kind that propels some and exposes others. He faced Leonard Williams, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Devon Witherspoon and more.
He faced the future, a path he had yet to pave.
“One of the things I want you guys to feel going through this program is that we have a vision for you and this football team,” Macdonald said, with a sheet in one hand and a clicker in the other. “I want us to take a minute here and fast-forward to January at the NFC championship. It’s 30-something degrees. It’s wet. It’s windy. It’s [expletive] for them, but it’s just right for us. We’re loose. We’re focused. We’re confident. We just spent the last nine months stacking every opportunity.
“The team across from us in the other locker room, they’ve seen the tape. They know what they’re in for — 11 guys playing as one, every snap. They know that we’re like that. They know they’re facing a bunch of men that won’t give up. They know they’re facing a team that won’t die, that won’t quit. They know. It’s inevitable. So let’s go to work.”
Macdonald’s vision was inevitable. We know that now.
But the path had potholes. Twenty-one months, one starting quarterback, one offensive coordinator, one erratic wide receiver and several starting linebackers later, the Seahawks are here. On Sunday they’ll host the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC championship game — after securing a division title, home-field advantage and the No. 1 playoff seed. After dispatching the San Francisco 49ers decisively, in back to back games. After showing the world that they’re like that.
This is not an accident or a coincidence. It’s a masterpiece made of a million brush strokes. It’s a path paved with bricks, with sweat and blood and grit, by grinders bought into a larger goal. Forging the future. Making it real.
As Seahawks linebacker Ernest Jones IV said after Saturday’s 41-6 divisional round win over San Francisco: “Mike’s the biggest thing — just being able to start Day 1 [and say], ‘Hey, this is what type of team we’re going to be. But we can’t be that team unless we work for it.’ He’s constantly had us working at it.”
Perfection was never the point. Quite the contrary.
Macdonald is the biggest reason the Seahawks are here. Because his ego has never been bigger than his hunger to grow. Because he’s laid bricks alongside everyone else.
“I think what makes Mike special is he practices what he preaches,” said Williams, a second-team All-Pro in his second season with Macdonald. “He’s always talking about chasing edges. He’s always talking about what’s important now. He openly will talk to us about what he has to work on as a coach. He talks about where he lacks and where he wants to grow.
“You see the growth. I think him setting that standard as a leader seeps into the rest of the team and allows us to feel like we can be that same way. It allows us to show vulnerabilities where we’re weak and let other guys know that’s where we need to grow. It just creates an open dynamic where, when we’re in the film room and we’re coaching things, you don’t see guys getting offended. It’s like, ‘OK, this is something we need to attack.’ We’re not attacking the player. We’re attacking the problem.”
Macdonald and general manager John Schneider — who on Thursday was named NFL Executive of the Year by the Pro Football Writers of America — have spent 21 months attacking problems. When the Seahawks’ run defense struggled in 2024, they traded for Jones and instantly improved. When quarterback Geno Smith and wide receiver DK Metcalf requested trades, they signed Sam Darnold and Cooper Kupp, elevated Smith-Njigba … and upgraded. When the Seahawks offense sputtered, they fired coordinator Ryan Grubb and hired Klint Kubiak. When the offensive line lacked, they drafted North Dakota State standout Grey Zabel.
When key contributors went down, they inserted Drake Thomas, Ty Okada, Josh Jones, Brandon Pili, Patrick O’Connell, Cody White, Dareke Young, etc., and won anyway.
When the Rams torched a typically dominant defense for 581 total yards, 457 passing yards, 26 first downs, 6.6 yards per play and four touchdowns on Dec. 18 … well, just you wait.
Do you have any doubt Macdonald will respond Sunday?
“Any time the result doesn’t go your way, I got a big hand in how we play, too,” said Macdonald, whose defense allowed an NFL-best 17.2 points per game in the regular season. “There’s several [play calls] in that game that you want back. It stings that that’s the case, but that’s the case. So you’ve got to confront it and say, ‘OK, what are the things we can do throughout the week to put ourselves in better situations, where we can help our guys out more?’
“That’s the mentality. It was the same thing after [a loss to] Tampa Bay. You can feel it in real time. When your guys are in a certain position and it’s not necessarily advantageous for them, it turns out that’s on the design of the play and what you’re asking them to do.”
Macdonald’s vision was inevitable only because the Seahawks made it so.
And the message, like the path, was peppered with potholes.
When asked about his suddenly viral speech Wednesday, Macdonald smiled and said: “It’s funny, when [Seahawks chief communications officer Dave Pearson] showed me that, all I was thinking about was how nervous I was going to the first team meeting. I don’t know if you could tell. That was a good editing job by our people. There’s probably some more awkward pauses throughout that. …
“Everybody talks about what your first message to the team is going to be. It’s really overblown, frankly. You think about, ‘What am I going to talk to the team about? What’s the first thing? I don’t want to say the wrong thing.’ But it just came to me. I think God just allowed me to take the pressure away and said, ‘This is what you should say.’ It was pretty powerful. It’s pretty awesome.”
As was the path from purgatory to the brink of a Super Bowl.
But Macdonald’s forecast was less prophetic. Meteorologists call for dry skies Sunday.
The Seahawks will have to make life [expletive] for the Rams in other ways.
