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TEN WORST MOMENTS OF THE MIKE HOLMGREN ERA

With training camp just over three weeks away and Mike Holmgren’s final season as head coach of the Seattle Seahawks drawing ever closer, it seems fitting to take a look back at the tenure of the most successful coach in team history. While Mike Holmgren has taken this team to heights that fans once only dreamed about, there have also been plenty of bumps along the way. Here now are the ten worst things to happen to the Seahawks since Mike Holmgren took over the team in 1999:

10—Losing on Seahawk Stadium’s Opening Day

It was supposed to mark a new era in Seahawks football: new stadium, new uniforms, new conference, and hopefully a new tradition of winning. Seattle was facing the most hapless of their new division rivals, namely the woeful Arizona Cardinals. Best of all, Trent Dilfer was set to return only four weeks after suffering a knee injury that looked like it could have kept him out for the entire season. Dilfer had become a fan favorite after his four wins in relief of Matt Hasselbeck the previous year had take Seattle to the brink of a playoff birth and was riding a 15-game winning streak as he took the field on that muggy summer Sunday. What could possibly go wrong?

Try everything. The Seahawks were lethargic and ineffective, bogging down and committing two turnovers inside the red zone. In the second half Seattle gave up a 58-yard touchdown run to Thomas Jones, allowed a 95-yard kickoff return touchdown by MarTay Jenkins, and then could not stop a 13-play, 90 yard touchdown drive to seal a 24-13 victory with just over three minutes left to play. On what was supposed to be a new beginning for Seattle’s troubled franchise, the Same Old Seahawks were in full force.

9—“F**k them!”

Matt Hasselbeck has been one of the league’s better quarterbacks for so long it’s hard to remember how rocky a start he had in Seattle. The one-time “Mr. August” started off his first September as a starting quarterback by eking out a 9-6 victory over Cleveland, only to get spanked by the Eagles 27-3 in Seattle’s home opener. The game was so bad that by the third quarter, chants of “DIL-FER! DIL-FER!” began to rain down from the Husky Stadium stands as fans wanted Hasselbeck benched in favor of Super Bowl-winning quarterback Trent Dilfer. Mike Holmgren had a different opinion, and as he addressed the team after that miserable performance, he made that opinion abundantly clear.

In an article printed that week by Sports Illustrated, two unnamed players said that Holmgren gave the following response to fans who booed Matt Hasselbeck: “F**k them.” Mike Holmgren immediately issued an apology, but the damage had been done. While Holmgren was trying to make the point that he—not the fans—would determine who would start at quarterback, the comments only reinforced a growing divide between Mike Holmgren and Seahawks fans. Worse, the fact that players would relay the incident to the media showed just how divided the locker room was at that point in time, which was a problem that would hurt this team for the next few seasons.

8—Tampa Bay Ends Jon Kitna’s Winning Streak

Two years prior to that miserable performance, Mike Holmgren probably could have been elected mayor of Seattle by a show of hands. The Super Bowl-winning coach arrived in 1999 to much fanfare and promised to do everything in his power to get Seattle a championship. For a brief time it looked as though Holmgren would have an easy task: after starting 3-2, the Seahawks rattled off five straight victories and looked as though they could steamroll their way into the playoffs. Not only had they won at Arrowhead Stadium for the first time since 1990, but they had managed this quick start without their best offensive weapon in Joey Galloway, who had returned two weeks earlier. Running back Ricky Watters was a big reason for Seattle’s success, but perhaps their best players was quarterback Jon Kitna. The local boy was making good for his hometown team and looked to be the dependable field general Seattle hadn’t enjoyed for far too long.

And then Tampa Bay came to town. The eventual NFC runners-up pummelled Jon Kitna all day long, winning the game despite gaining only 156 yards and losing starting quarterback Trent Dilfer to a broken collarbone. Kitna was sacked three times and turned the ball over six times, giving Tampa Bay a 16-3 win and giving the rest of the league the blueprint on how to beat the Jon Kitna-led Seahawks: blitz, blitz, and more blitz. After starting 8-2, Seattle won only one out of its last six games, limped into the playoffs, and were quickly dispatched by the Miami Dolphins. Jon Kitna never quite recovered from that debacle and was allowed to leave as a free agent after the 2000 season, while Seattle ended up blowing up that ’99 team to head off future salary cap problems. They wouldn’t return to the playoffs for another five years.

7—The Husky Stadium Years

Seattle’s home stadium proved to be worth the two years it would take to build it, but building it on the same site of the infamous Kingdome meant that the Seahawks would need to find a new place to hang their hats for the 2000 and 2001 seasons. Husky Stadium took in the wayward Hawks and got a brand new Field Turf playing surface for their generosity, the first of its kind in the NFL. The fancy new turf was about the only good thing Husky Stadium had going for it, however, in the two years it played host to the Seattle Seahawks.

Husky Stadium is a great venue for a college football game in September. For a professional football game in December, it’s miserable. Rain and bitter cold winds blew in off Lake Washington, making warm coats and stadium blankets a must. Getting too and from the games was a difficult task, as even people who took advantage of the free shuttle service often found themselves stuck in traffic for hours. Compounding the problem was the fact that the 2000 and 2001 Seahawks teams weren’t all that good; scalpers would pace back and forth in front of the main gate with dozens of tickets in their hands and the home field advantage Seattle enjoys today simply did not exist. Worst of all, the pervasive Washington Husky memorabilia (including the field logos) were a constant reminder that this wasn’t HOME, that they were playing football in somebody else’s house. It was a rough time to be a Seahawk—fan or player—and it’s hard to find anyone who remembers this time fondly.

6—2003: The Road to Nowhere

The 2003 season featured Seattle’s return to the playoffs for the first time since 1999. It was the first time since 1986 that the team had won 10 games in a season. The team went undefeated at home for the first time in history and was developing a true home field advantage. It looked to be proof that the team was finally turning the corner and could possibly start to shake the years of mediocrity. All of these are impressive feats considering the fact that the team lost six straight road games from October to December.

You name the problem and Seattle probably suffered it on the road that year. They were blown out by the Packers and the Vikings. They lost squeakers to the Steve Spurrier-led Redskins and the Cincinnati Bengals. Officials’ mistakes cost them in Baltimore (failing to restart the clock led to an extra 40 seconds for the Ravens) and in St. Louis (back judge tripping Bobby Engram on the way to a potential game-winning touchdown.) Everything that could go wrong for Seattle on the road DID go wrong in 2003. The worst part is that winning just two of those games—or beating the Rams on the road—would have given Seattle the division title, a playoff bye and a home game in the postseason. Instead, Seattle had to go back on the road one last time and lost to Green Bay in an overtime thriller. The Seahawks have improved their play on the road somewhat, but they still have trouble when they have to leave the cozy confines of Qwest Field.

5—The Problem Children: Koren Robinson and Jerramy Stevens

Robinson and Stevens are Exhibits A and B in rebuttal to anyone who questions Tim Ruskell’s character first approach. Both were first round draft choices with enormous potential, both lived up to that potential for one season and both saw their careers disintegrate thanks to their off-field problems. Robinson flamed out in dramatic fashion 2004. Two years after the best season of his career, Robinson missed six games due to team and league suspensions for substance abuse yet was allowed to start in Seattle’s playoff loss to the Rams regardless. Mike Holmgren would later talk about how he wanted to give Robinson every chance, but the troubled wide receiver couldn’t get his life straightened out and was released. A later infraction during his time with the Minnesota Vikings would earn Robinson a one-year suspension, and currently he is out of football.

Jerramy Stevens is another player who kept getting second chances he did not deserve. After being cited for DUI in 2003, Stevens promised to keep his nose clean and turned in a good season during Seattle’s Super Bowl run—except for his three dropped passes in that Super Bowl. Dropped passes turned the fans against Stevens and his off-field antics as described in recent Seattle Times articles turned Tim Ruskell against him. Stevens was allowed to leave as a free agent and was set to sign a big contract with Tampa Bay only to be pulled over for yet another DUI. He signed with Tampa anyway and re-signed with him this past offseason, but given his track record another relapse seems to be only a matter of time.

4—No Lead is Safe in 2004

The start of the 2004 season was everything Seahawk fans hoped it could be. After their near miss in 2003, the Hawks started off 2004 3-0 and looked to be cruising to an easy victory over the hated St. Louis Rams after their Week Four bye. Leading 27-10 with 8:42 left in the fourth quarter, the game looked all but won. Yet Seahawk fans watched in horror as the Rams scored 17 points to tie the game at the end of regulation. Worse, St. Louis won the toss, took possession in overtime, and promptly won the game with a 52-yard pass to Shaun McDonald. Losing to the Rams at home was painful enough, but giving up 23 unanswered points was a bitter blow, and one that lingered for a Seahawk team that lost its next two games and never recovered the swagger they had early in the 2004 season.

Lightning struck a second time later that season when the Dallas Cowboys came to town for a Monday Night Football game. For a while it looked as though it was Seattle’s turn to stage a comeback, erasing a 29-17 deficit with 22 fourth quarter points. The Seahawks led 39-29 with under three minutes left to go, but could only watch helplessly as Dallas turned around and score two more touchdowns to steal back the win, capping off the effort with a 17-yard coup de grace by current Seahawk Julius Jones, who finished with 198 yards rushing on the day. Seattle would barely win the division and make the playoffs that season, but were quickly dispatched by the Rams in a disappointing end to a promising season.

3—Shaun Alexander Loses His Mojo

Shaun Alexander first showed Seahawk fans what he could do midway through the 2001 season with a pair of 100-yard performances in relief of the injured Ricky Watters. He showed the world what he could do later that year on Sunday Night Football by turning in a 266-yard performance against the Raiders, at that time the fourth best rushing game in NFL history. Alexander took the starting job for good to finish the 2001 season and for the next four years never looked back. Alexander became the first man in NFL history to run for 15 touchdowns in five straight seasons, was consistently one of the top five backs in the league statwise, and in 2005 earned the league MVP award with 1,880 yards and 28 touchdowns, then a league record.

Seattle rewarded that MVP-caliber performance with a multi-million dollar contract in 2006, but the wheels fell off shortly thereafter. Injuries started catching up to him: Shaun suffered a broken foot in 2006 and a broken wrist last season. Age caught up with him: Shaun lost a step he couldn’t afford to lose and suddenly he couldn’t outrun anybody. In the space of two years Shaun Alexander went from multi-million dollar MVP to ex-Seahawk, and it’s an open question whether he will ever play again. Many different theories have been written as to Shaun Alexander’s sudden decline, not the least of which is…

2—Steve Hutchinson’s Departure

Steve Hutchinson fell to the Seahawks in the 2001 draft and the only thing missing was the gift wrap. The Michigan guard was a perfect fit on the left side of Seattle’s offensive line with Walter Jones, and the two formed the best guard-tackle combo in the league for years. Hutchinson’s contract was set to expire after the 2005 season and the two sides were at a stalemate. GM Tim Ruskell was reluctant to franchise Hutchinson after having to use the tag on Jones three straight years, and he figured it would be safe to let some other team set the bar. Rather than using the franchise tag on Hutch, Ruskell used the transition tag, reasoning that some other team would sign him to an offer sheet, Seattle could match and the problem would be solved. It would turn out to be the biggest mistake of Tim Ruskell’s career to date.

Ruskell didn’t count on the cunning of the Minnesota Vikings’ front office, who inked him to a 7-year, $49 million deal with the “poison pill” provision that the entire contract would be guaranteed if Hutchinson was not the highest paid lineman on the team at the time the contract was signed. As Jones was set to earn more money in 2006 than Hutchinson would, Seattle could not match the contract without triggering the poison pill. Unwilling to guarantee a contract of that size, Seattle was forced to let Hutchinson sign with Minnesota and has struggled to replace him ever since. Ironically, Seattle would later offer the same contract terms to free agent guard Kris Dielman in 2007 only to see him spurn Seattle to re-sign with San Diego for less money. Even if free agent Mike Wahle proves to be an adequate replacement, one can only wonder what Seattle could have done the last two years had they retained Hutchinson.

1—Super Bowl XL

There’s not much more to be said about Seattle’s one and only Super Bowl appearance. The truth is that everything went wrong for the Seahawks that day. The game was in Detroit, of all places, the majority of the public and media had bought into the “Jerome Bettis can get a ring in his hometown” angle, and Steeler fans outnumbered Seahawk fans by an obscene ratio for a supposedly neutral venue. And while the league has done its best to whitewash the officials’ performance, poll after poll supports the view of almost every Seahawk fan that the officiating was both bad and completely one-sided.

Yet worst of all is the fact that the Seahawks played a bad game right when they could least afford one. Jerramy Stevens dropped three passes. Josh Brown missed two field goals. Marquand Manuel got hurt and Etric Pruitt was not up to the challenge. Matt Hasselbeck lost his composure after the bogus holding call on Sean Locklear in the fourth quarter—something he has admitted—and threw an equally bad interception on the next play. Seattle should have won that football game despite Bill Leavy’s attempts to rig it; they were a much better team than the one that took the field that evening. And as fans are learning to their dismay, getting back to the Super Bowl is just as hard as getting there in the first place. Who knows how long it will take for the Seahawks to get another chance at a ring? Super Bowl XL will haunt the Seahawks and their fans until that day arrives.

Next Week: Ten Best Moments of the Mike Holmgren Era

Dishonorable Mention:
The Ahman Green Trade
Mike Holmgren’s First Game (28-20 loss to Detroit at home)
Holmgren’s Draft History
The Bobby Engram Holdout
2007 Playoff Blowout in Green Bay