BROCK AND SALK

Salk: Rooting again for Russell Wilson was fun, even if scars remain

Oct 23, 2024, 2:09 AM

Something unexpected happened to me on Sunday night. After I got home from a couple of youth basketball games, I settled in to eat dinner and watch the final three quarters of Sunday Night Football. The day had already been a good one with the Seahawks winning (we won’t discuss the scores of the basketball games!) and the SNF matchup of Aaron Rodgers and Russell Wilson was intriguing, even if it was at least five years past its expiration date.

For the first time in years, I was rooting for Russ.

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OK, at first I was mostly just rooting against Rodgers, which is easy to do. After all, this is a man who quit on his Packers teammates in the middle of the NFC Championship Game, got upset when they reacted by drafting his replacement, tried to hold his team hostage, bragged about making his coaches wait outside his house on a busy highway while he finished his date with a shaman, and is now trying to be coach, coordinator and GM of his current team (without much success at any of those roles).

I could probably come up with a few more transgressions, but I don’t feel the need to do my own research on this. Suffice it to say, he is pretty easy to root against, and that was before he blamed the media for his teams’ issues (shocker!).

Anyway, I digress. This is about Russ and not Rodgers.

It had been years since I had rooted for Russ. The last two seasons in Denver were such a trainwreck. The first one was full of such emotion after he left Seattle, plus the promise of a better draft pick for the Seahawks the worse the Broncos did. The second was more about confirmation and an almost morbid fascination in seeing how bad things could get. In year one, Russ tried to go the Rodgers route and control everything. By year two, he was trying to salvage his reputation. Now in Pittsburgh, he is just trying to get back on the field.

I don’t know if that story arc has made Russ into a sympathetic character, but it sure has taken some of the sting out of the bitterness. And with Rodgers on the other side, it was pretty easy to sing “Renegade” and root for the Steelers.

And it was … fun. I got nostalgic. I remembered how fun it was to watch Russ play.

He isn’t a generic NFL quarterback. He moves in a unique way that is instantly recognizable regardless of what uniform he is wearing. He has that compact delivery and the ball zips out of his hand. He doesn’t run as fast as he used to, but he’s still nimble and Sundance-like accurate when he’s on the move. He still throws the deep ball as well as anyone, with touch and enough air to give his receivers a chance to make plays. He still finds himself in the middle of strange plays, weird games, and bizarre moments on the field.

Just like that, I missed the Russell Wilson years. They were fun! They had an element of “us against the world” where only people in Seattle seemed to understand how special he was and everyone else could only focus on the yardage totals (or lack thereof). He made wizard-like comebacks, led game-winning drives, pulled rabbits from (hats) and did it all in a way that resembled no other quarterback in the league.

I found myself forgetting some of the vitriol. I even imagined for a moment what a Wilson Ring of Honor ceremony might look like one day.

And then the game ended, he spoke, and the dream disintegrated.

I think the biggest thing is just knowing who you are, knowing the belief you have in yourself and knowing also, too, it’s my first time back and I was like OK, I’m starting to feel it again.

I’m just grateful to my teammates. These guys did so much. They did so well. We all just gave our all. Defense was lights out against a really good quarterback, and I think we made a lot of plays. I think that crowd was unbelievable. I just think about the moments, just the moments being locked in the moment of time of saying this is my first game here, how special is this? I thank God for it, so that was a blessing itself.

I feel a sense of just unbelievable gratitude. I think all the people that have helped me along the way just even transitioning here, just coming to an amazing place, when Coach (Mike) Tomlin called me and Omar (Khan), I knew it was here. When I talked to Cam Heyward and T.J. Watt and Minkah (Fitzpatrick), I knew it was here. The men that we have in that locker room, the bible studies that we have, the communication that we have on the field, the time that we share together in Latrobe. Even though I was down and out a little bit there, just sitting on the back porch talking life, talking ball, talking moments. All that I think was in a way played into tonight in just the belief.

Wow.

Hearing the cliches, the overcompensating excitement, the frenetic energy just brought back reality. It made me remember the ridiculous need to “cook,” the back office attempt to get Pete Carroll fired, the phony relationships with teammates and some of the lies told to the community.

I guess I’m not fully ready to let it all go. There are some scars there that maybe will never heal. But I’m glad I can now enjoy watching him play again. Maybe that is enough.

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Salk: Rooting again for Russell Wilson was fun, even if scars remain