Is Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch on his last legs?

Marshawn Lynch will miss a game for the first time in 61 weeks. No big deal, right? Depends on who you ask.

“Yeah, this is a big deal that this guy for the first time in his career has shown a bit of mortality,” Brock Huard said Monday on 710 ESPN Seattle’s “Brock and Salk.”

Lynch reportedly had an MRI that showed some damage in his hamstring and has been ruled out of tonight’s game against the Lions. Lynch has missed only one game since the 2011 season.

Coach Pete Carroll said Lynch aggravated his hamstring in the team’s Week 3 win over Chicago, after feeling some discomfort the week prior. Lynch has also been dealing with back, neck and calf issues.

Unlike the less punishing positions on a football field, NFL running backs typically have a limited shelf life, with few lead backs still rushing past the age of 30 or in the vicinity of 2,000 career carries. Lynch, 29, is in his ninth season and has been a workhorse through his career, tallying 2,071 carries.

“There has been a history at that position that it’s not a slow death. It’s a painful, oh my gosh, what happened,” Huard said.

Huard said he believes Lynch will return this season, but that game time is where he’s always made sure to shine. The fact that he’d miss one should absolutely ring some alarm bells.

“It’s absolutely the biggest concern you’ve had in his career, in his tenure here in Seattle,” Huard said. “A guy that has always (been) built and equipped to get to gameday. (It’s) never been about practice, never been about off-season, never been about OTA’s, never been about training camp. It’s about being there when it matters the most, and for consecutive weeks he will not.”

Huard, along with ESPN Insider Mike Sando, noted that it’s been a year-to-year observation with Lynch, as he himself has made comments about retiring. Sando said the injury is “of course” a concern, and that it’s amazing the former first rounder hasn’t slowed at all before this, comparing it to bonus time in a video game.

“You know it’s coming at a certain point and you feel just tremendous if you’re a Seahawks fan what you’ve gotten out of him,” Sando said. “It’s always felt like it’s year-to-year and now we’ll just kind of see. It doesn’t seem like he’s got a major injury or anything. I would think he will get going here at a certain point. But at least [rookie running back Thomas] Rawls had a hundred-yard game. That can have healing powers, too.”

Mike Salk, meanwhile, decried the tendency for overreaction in this day and age of sports radio and football fandom, calling the death cry on a single injury “insanity.” He said people are turning a 29-year-old physical specimen into a feeble old man. He compared it to the doomsday predictions over Peyton Manning three years ago following the future Hall of Famer’s neck surgeries. Salk said he’s been burned too many times by doubting Lynch in the past and isn’t ready to do that again.

“I’m not telling you, you’re wrong,” he said. “You guys may very well be right and this may be the beginning of the end for Marshawn Lynch, but I am in no way pointed in that direction because he’s going to miss a game and a half with a calf injury or a hamstring, or whatever is really going on there.”

Huard noted that his concerns go beyond just one game, as Lynch has seemed off for the past two weeks – rushing for only 41 yards against the Packers in Week 2 and managing only five carries in Week 3. Huard added that Lynch has been unconventional in every way throughout his career, meaning there is no way to string together a real track record.

“I’m not saying he’s done, but to say or act like this is no big deal, I’m not there either,” he said. “This is something significant over the last two to three weeks and he is in a position he’s never been in his career.”

Salk said, more than anything, he is willing to question whether Lynch’s mentality is in the right place.

“I’d be more concerned about whether or not Marshawn truly wants to be out there, wants to make this his passion,” he said. “I think that right there is a legitimate concern. As for the injury, guys get injured and just because you get injured once does not mean it’s the beginning of the end for you.”

Salk said he will be more concerned if Lynch’s injury lasts into second half of season.

“If you are able to limit some of his carries, limit some of the pounding and still have the Marshawn that you expect at some point this season, maybe he is even better in the second half than he’s been,” Salk said. “It’s not that I think there is zero cause for concern, but I think it’s way too early to start jumping on the ‘is Marshawn done?’ bandwagon.”

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