Seahawks’ Pete Carroll sees no end in sight to his coaching career

RENTON – With his contract situation settled and his 65th birthday approaching, Pete Carroll says there’s no end in sight to his coaching career.

“I know you guys keep wondering, ‘How long is he going to coach?’ or whatever. I’ve got no end to this. I don’t see it. I’m just going for it,” Carroll said Saturday after the Seahawks held their first practice of training camp. “I’m going to go as long as it’s fun and it’s good and we’re winning games and all that. I don’t feel any different than I felt before. Matter of fact, I feel better. I’m under my playing weight. I’m in great shape. I’m ready to go.”

At 64, Carroll became the NFL’s oldest head coach when the Giants’ Tom Coughlin retired after last season. Carroll turns 65 in September, and he’ll be 68 by the time his new three-year contract extension expires after the 2019 season.

The question of how long Carroll may want to continue coaching was raised anew earlier this offseason, when his contract situation remained unsettled longer than many expected. But when his extension and that of general manager John Schneider got done within days of each other last week, it seemed as though it was just a matter of order, with Carroll wanting Schneider’s future secured before taking care of his own.

Carroll confirmed as much Saturday when asked about Schneider’s deal, saying it was “hugely important that we did that first.” The two came to Seattle together in 2010 and have overseen the team during the most successful stretch in franchise history, with five playoff appearances, one Super Bowl title and another Super Bowl appearance. They’ve been the perfect pairing despite their atypical arrangement, with includes Carroll having final say on the team’s roster.

“I don’t want to do this without John, and I wanted to make sure that there was no issues with that, and so we saw that through first,” Carroll said. “It took a while to get that done, but it’s extremely important. He’s a tremendous partner, he’s a great GM and he’s doing nothing but great stuff – that’s all he’s done – and we needed to do this together. I knew I wasn’t going anywhere …”

Asked about his extension being for three years, Carroll said: “That’s just the next stop along the way,” referring to when the deal will expire. As for what it means that Schneider’s extension runs two years longer, Carroll said: “That he’s a younger man, I guess. He wants more security. I didn’t care about that. It didn’t matter to me.”

Does Carroll want Seattle to be his last stop?

“No, I don’t even want to think that,” he said. “No, there ain’t no last stops. Just keep going. I know you guys are wondering, if this is what 65 gets you, I’m jacked up, I’m ready to go, I don’t have any other thought about that. So if you guys are worried about being 65, OK, well, look at me. It ain’t that bad. I think it’s pretty fun.”

When Carroll signed his previous deal in 2014, he said that his level of competitiveness would be a factor in how much longer he wants to continue coaching. He recalled being told long ago that older coaches don’t lose their mental acuity so much as they lose their willingness to “fight the fight,” a must-have in such a demanding profession.

From the sounds of it, he still has plenty of that left.

“I’m telling you, I’ve been talking about it because I’ve been more excited in the approach to this camp than I could ever remember,” Carroll said when asked if, after all these years, he still feels the same excitement on the first day of training camp. “It’s just where we’ve come from, what we’ve done, the guys we’re working with, the coaches, the continuity, all those kinds of things, and really spurred on and inspired by the guys that have been around here and the way they’ve handled this offseason and approached it. They’ve got me all jacked up, so I’ve got to be careful, I might be a little bit out of control here.”