The Seattle Seahawks appear to have smoothed things over with Russell Wilson, but not everyone is a fan of the way the quarterback handled this offseason. During an interview on the Big Show Network, former Packers general manager Ron Wolf called out Wilson and other “diva” quarterbacks.
“There is a huge change, and it started with Russell Wilson, then went to [DeShaun] Watson, and now it went to [Aaron] Rodgers,” Wolf said, via Big Show Network’s Daniel Plocher. “It appears that today’s quarterbacks want to be more than quarterbacks. In my time, they were hired to play the position of quarterback. That’s what they are being paid to do. These guys, they want to pick the coach, pick the players, it’s an interesting dilemma.
All three of these guys have signed long-term contracts, and they are under contract. I’m sure at that time there wasn’t anyone holding a gun to their head saying that you have to sign. Now, they’re not happy. They’re not happy with the team they signed a contract with… We’ve got a lot of divas playing in the league right now… The thing that I fail to understand is, all these guys that are doing this (Watson, Rodgers, Wilson) have long-term deals. I can’t believe the game has changed that remarkably.”
Wolf was the Packers GM from 1991 to 2000 and Seahawks general manager John Schneider was also a scout (1993 to 1996) during his tenure in Green Bay. His comments reference Wilson’s media tour at the beginning of the offseason when the quarterback criticized the hits he has taken throughout his career and admitted he wanted more say in personnel decisions.
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Carroll Admitted Wilson’s Comments Could Have Been a ‘Rule No. 2’ Violation
Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll has two basic rules that help guide the Seahawks’ team philosophy. Rule number one is “always protect the team,” and some viewed Wilson’s offseason critiques as a violation of this idea. Carroll shot down down this notion but admitted Wilson may have violated the team’s second rule.
“Hopefully, Russ will always be better for it, because he’s been through a lot of that and hopefully other guys can learn from that as well,” Carroll explained during the team’s pre-draft press conference. “The power comes from knowing really what the truth [is] and knowing what’s going on. I’m not not sharing the truth. The truth is he wasn’t getting traded and he’s on our roster. He’s signed up for a long time around here and anything that could ever take place was so far out there that could ever happen, it was not even worth considering. Unfortunately, that’s kind of how it went.
If anything happened, it wasn’t a rule number one violation, it might have been a rule number two which is ‘no whining, no complaining, no excuses.’ Where you say something that kind of gives you something that can be challenged. That’s coach talk, but we dealt through all of it.”
Brandon Marshall: ‘Russell Wilson Is Going to Be a Seattle Seahawk for a Very Long Time’
Former Seahawks wide receiver Brandon Marshall has been vocal about the disconnect between Wilson and Seattle. Marshall has since changed his stance recently noting that he sees Wilson staying in Seattle “for a very long time.”
“Russell Wilson is going to be a Seattle Seahawk for a very long time,” Marshall noted in April on FS1’s First Things First, per NBC Sports Northwest. “Now we can’t predict the future… We got so many things that can come into play down the road. We know that. But right now, Pete Carroll said right now, ‘The difference in philosophy that we have? Let’s get on the same page. I need to give my Hall-of-Fame quarterback everything he needs to be successful to lead this team.'”
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Ex-NFL GM Calls Out ‘Diva’ Russell Wilson