Pete Carroll accepts the blame for worst call in Seahawks history

Pete Carroll was a number of things for the Seattle Seahawks. He was the Vice President of Football Operations and he was also the head coach. Carroll was also the best coach in Seattle football history (any argument otherwise is truly only Carroll hate), and he was likely the classiest of head coaches as well.

Did Carroll need to leave after the 2023 season? Very likely. His defenses had negative trends (bad run defense and poor linebacker coverage, to name two) that had not been reversed in several seasons. Possibly, Carroll did not know how to fix them.

Carroll was also too loyal to his coordinators. He needed to never elevate Clint Hurtt to defensive coordinator but Hurtt had been with Carroll for a while and the head coach thought Hurtt deserved a chance to lead the defense. That was the beginning of the end for Carroll with the Seahawks.

Pete Carroll and Marshawn Lynch discuss the worst play call in Seattle Seahawks history

Still, Carroll was open about the team's issues whether he could fix them or not. He also was never one to deflect blame for a certain situation. This includes the play that for all intents and purposes ended Super Bowl XLIX when Seattle decided to throw the ball from the one-yard line instead of handing the ball to Marshawn Lynch. Lynch might not have scored on the play, but he might have on the next one. He never got the chance.

Seattle's offensive coordinator at the time was Darrell Bevell. He was not bad at his job, but he will always be remembered for the coach who made the call. That cost the Seahawks a second-straight Super Bowl victory almost certainly.

Speaking with Lynch on a recent episode of Lynch's podcast, Politickin', Carroll refused to place the blame fully on Bevell. Carroll said, "We did it the way we always did. There’s defensive coordinators, there’s offensive coordinators, they call stuff, we play the game. I’m responsible for every call that was ever made."

To which Lynch told his fellow podcaster Doug Hendrickson, "Doug, if you didn’t catch that, (Darrell) Bevell made the (expletive) call, and Pete didn’t get to it quick enough to get out of that (expletive). That’s what (Pete) told you in a nutshell."

To be fair, both Carroll and Lynch are both correct. Carroll should accept some of the blame because while he did not make the horrible play call, he could have changed it as head coach. He didn't. Lynch is correct in that the ultimate blame lies with Bevell who chose to make the call.

12s all know that the Seahawks would have had three chances after Lynch's initial run down to the one-yard line for Lynch to punch the ball in. He would have eventually and Seattle would have won. Sadly, Seahawks fans never got to see that.

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