Mike Macdonald: “We Have To Become A Championship Team” | Press Conference – July 23, 2025

Mike Macdonald: “We Have To Become A Championship Team” | Press Conference – July 23, 2025

Uh, first of all, great to see everybody. I mean, it’s um. It’s an awesome atmosphere, man. I’ll, I’ll tell you what, I’ll put our training camp atmosphere, the 12s, just the weather. I mean just everything all the above is just, uh, second to none. So really blessed to be out here with the, with the guys, great spirits locked in, you know, it’s the first day back, uh, so there’s some things we’re working through, but really optimistic. Guys are in a great spot, so I’ll go tack the rest of the day and we’ll see you tomorrow. to see on day one. I think it’s, it’s fun to see the progress from come from the spring and, you know. I’ll tell you what, like, the guys are on it, the intents there, and you know, it’s it’s us as coaches like, hey, let’s point out the things where we want to grow from day to day, but, um. Yeah, it’s great to have the guys, you know, back, and we missed them. Tory-Horton out there doing a lot of the work today. Where, where’s he at physically now after this break — between mini camp and you know
— we’re gonna, we have a plan to bring him back full speed, but I mean when he’s out there, he’s full go. We’re just kind of managing, you know, his reps right now, but doing a great job. He’s right in the mix. Mike, the mixing and matching on the offensive line, how much would I continues trial phase right now, it’ll probably go into next week when we put pads on, yeah, for sure. — And the limited to see him out there like he does when he’s
— great. He looks great. He’s he’s, he’s in a great spot mentally, um, just awesome to see him, see him do all the things that we wanted him to do from the get-go. So I know he’s really excited about what’s going on and, um. Yeah, I mean, great, great first day with Ken. This is your 2nd mini camp, but I know it’s day one, but does it already feel different than last year already? I know it’s day one, but I mean, yeah, totally. I just, you know, second time around, I think, I think it’s the same message with the rest of the team. If you, if you don’t have the mentality of, hey, let’s assess where we were, you know, what we were thinking, why we’re doing the things, how we can learn how we can grow, uh, I’m right there with the guys and, um. Yeah, it’s more confident, more, more like just to have a better feel for what we’re trying to achieve on a day in day out basis, um, how we message things, keeping a little tighter, um, just a connection with the guys, just being around for, you know, for another year, whole staff really so, um, yeah, it’s really exciting, but, um, a lot of growth. Like when uh you’ve got this time it’s off season between training camp and you know, um, you spend more time studying offense or studying other defenses? Uh, it’s a good question. Um, probably this, uh, like from, from, from the spring till now more offense, uh, I think you’re trying to understand in the time from the end of the season to offseason program like structurally where you wanna, where you wanna try to take some of our defenses, so, um. Yeah, but in the summer it’s probably more so towards our opponents. For me personally, you spend any time with Clintub whiteboarding, hey, you present this, we would do this, yeah, more so over tape or just most of our conversations have to do with football, you know, we don’t have a lot of interest outside of this, so, uh, but yeah, just love sharing those ideas, bouncing stuff, bouncing stuff off one another, you know, we’re doing a lot of situational work out there, so we’re, you know, we’re constantly going back, hey, this gives us trouble or this is a pain in the butt. And, um, you know, you wanna keep it systematic to what we’re doing, but, uh, it’s great to have an insight, uh, from Clint. How close or not closegen being um, you know, we’ll see, we’ll see. It’s, it’s we’re we’re going into the season probably, um, throughout the rest of camp and then we’ll go from there. But, uh, yeah, I mean, I think, I think, you know. Well we’ll just hold on to the timeline right now, but we’re not, — we’re not necessarily close right now
— about you and Clint uh having a lot of interest outside of football. Like was it clear when you were in that process of hiring him that you guys kind of saw things the same way, just the way you approach football? was it pretty obvious personality wise you guys were a good fit football wise. Trying to go back to what I was thinking at the time, you know, there’s a, there’s a lot of people that Clint has worked with that I trust, um, and, uh. To have those opinions about what it was like working with I mean, uh, Kennedy Palma is a great example, just, uh, working with him in Minnesota, uh, obviously, you know what Gary brought to the table, but yeah, I mean you’re looking, these are the guys you’re working with every day and you’re gonna go to battle with and, and Clint is, uh, is a high character guy, high integrity, great football acumen obviously we love the system that he’s bringing to the table, but, um, yeah, it’s fun to work with him every day. How much do you relish these moments training in terms of teaching, you know, as a teacher and you know getting them up to working with the players. Well, it’s critical. I mean, guys are gonna learn what to do and how to do it, and you’re only allowed a certain amount of allotted time on the field and our theory is, is, you know, we can, we’re trying to use that time better than anybody else because and be more efficient. So, um, our guys can play better ultimately. So, um, yeah, it’s critical this time of year for sure. Uh, yeah, right now he’s on NIR, uh, I’m sorry, on, um, NFI, excuse me, my acronym’s jacked up, but he’s working through a back right now. Um, long term I think he’s gonna be fine, but working through it, uh, you know, Hank’s a bat. He’s a 12 year guy. I mean, we’re taking our time with it, so we’re not in a hurry. Griffin, he says. Yeah, Shaq just had a little bit of an illness last night, so we’re just playing, you know, being precautious. What was something that we were working through. There’s a process behind it, you know, we had Shaq come and visit and, uh, he had a great visit, kind of Twilight zone coming back into the building and officers are flipped around, new, new faces and everything, but he fits in great, you know, the building, the staff love him and, uh. You know, it’s kind of only a couple of days with, with the rest of the DB room, but he’s gonna be a guy we’re gonna lean on being a vet presence and with those guys and it’s been, uh, it’s been fun so far, but excited to get him out there working with the, with the rest of the team. it was mandatory earlier this summer having everybody here. That positions of training camp. I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you. The the attendance you had when it wasn’t mandatory back earlier in the spring or whatever, how much of a better position does that put you in today on day one in training camp? I, I think it’s, I think it’s really important personally, um. I think the guy, the guys feel it. They feel the confidence, uh, you know, you talk about our just our insults today. It’s like, hey, I’ve heard this 3 times already, you know, rather than the first time you’re hearing it, uh, offensively, you know, I think we almost had 100% participation the whole time and so, um, you can feel the like the execution right now where they’re at compared to they were first day of the spring and then defensively we’re on a little bit of a different timeline. But uh you feel the connectedness with the guys and and that’s really important, especially on defense, you know, you gotta play off each other a lot of chemistry that’s necessary to play good defense. Elijah I didn’t have any conversations with him. It’s just understood that, you know, we’re in a what we’re trying to achieve as a football team, and we love Noah, wish him the best, but, um, we also love the guys that are still here and Um, they know what’s at stake and it’s gonna be a lot of fun watching that competition in the tight end room. Um, we did, we just, we released him a few days ago. We, we, I’m not gonna tell you exactly why, but there’s multiple reasons. the spring. We got a lot of new personnel on on that side of the ball and you see how much can you really gauge in terms of where they are right now before you go out? You’re not, you’re not, you’re not gonna know these things come in pieces, I think, and I think it’s just a process. So I think you just have daily goals of what you’re trying to achieve. Um, you’re gonna hit a lot of them, you’re gonna miss the target on some of them, and then you kind of recalibrate and go. I mean, there’s gonna be stages to camp too right now we’re in a kind of a ramp phase and execution phase. We’re not really physically competing, so you know, some of that evaluation is gonna take time. So you know, when you get into pads and you start doing more situational work. Uh, one of our philosophies is we’re gonna get a ton of reps over the course of time, uh, all those battles will be able to, you know, kind of show themselves and declare themselves and schematically, uh, you know, we know who we’re gonna be, but what how we’re gonna do it, how we’re gonna call it, how we’re gonna formation it. You know that’ll that’ll come into, into, you know, present itself more clear, you know, towards the end of camp. Yeah, we’re we’re right on schedule. I know that’s. Fairly common these days, but when you have a new offense, a lot of new players, — how important is that time they got it
— speaks to the connection, you know, when we talk a lot about 12 was one around here and it wasn’t, it wasn’t like I’m going to Sam telling him to get the guys together. I mean, I was totally driven by Sam and the rest of the guys, um, so yeah, it is. I mean, I don’t know how many routes they ran or, you know, how well it was, but it’s just important for them to be together, you know, talk through those things, and I think that sets them up to have a better start to camp, and that’s really important. Sounds kind of played all over the place. He got some guard. Uh, is it kind of a 3 person race there R card right now? Uh, I wouldn’t say so. I mean, Jane’s right there though. I mean, we up to this point, I mean he won our Too program, um. He just, he just keeps having great days and so uh. I’m excited to see how it shakes out. It’s gonna take time, but like we’re gonna, it’s gonna declare itself, you know, but, um, I don’t wanna just put a number on, on the guys right now. — You
— said
— you, yeah, we have a, we our strength guys, you know, Danny and Ivan, they put together a great offseason program and it was both a like a group competition over the course of the offseason and individual. There’s all sorts of different metrics that we keep track of, but, um, yeah, Jan won it and, um, he had, he had a tremendous offseason, so really exciting. Brady-Russell. Well, I think, I think. What Brady brings to the table is he can do fullback stuff and he can do tight end stuff and so that makes you just more multiple on offense and how you can formation stuff, so. That’s kind of, that’s what I mean, whether or not Noah was here or not, — that’s what Brady brings to the table
— to coach Mike-Morris since Becket Fish again, didn’t play a lot of snaps late in the season last year. What do you need to see from him going into year 3 to create more opportunities for him to see the field? Well, you know, the D line is, um, it’s exciting. I mean, we got a lot of, a lot of great talent there, a lot of great vet presence, uh, you know, us, we’re always trying to kind of figure out the pieces of the puzzle, you know, we take pride in the guys can play multiple spots, um. But the things that that Mike’s great at just show that when the pads come on and when competition hits and we start playing preseason games. He knows that I mean it’s a production business and, um, but we’re excited about Mike. I mean, he, he’s one of those guys that he’s he’s a bigger guy that can play the edge, can reduce down so, um, he’s got a pretty cool, uh, skill set and stout out to you about Marcus Lawrence. Yeah, I love to ask about the Law. He’s He’s like The best Drill player I’ve ever seen in my life. I like you could ask him to do any drill known to mankind and just like the trust he has and why you’re doing it. I mean he is 1000% every rep, the intent of what he’s trying to create, um. And that’s the standard that he’s setting for our front. So I mean, and the guys don’t have a, you know, a choice but to fall in line and it’s just exciting to see him out there working and you know what he can do on the field. I mean just the tape speaks for itself, but, uh, you understand kind of how it comes to life based on how he works. How rare is that for a veteran like that? — Maybe to take reps off or drills off if I see him
— I can’t speak for everybody, but you know, sometimes, uh, vets come in saying, look, I don’t understand. I can do that or I don’t do it a certain way. Uh, but that, that’s not DeMarcus, he’s, uh. He’s just, just really fun to, you know, work with and I know our, you know, AD obviously loves him, but, um, Heinz and CP just can’t get enough of them. You talk about, you know, the atmosphere of the fans here, first day of camp it’s fun, and of course fans have big expectations. How do you and your staff manage the expectations going into your second year into the 2025 campaign? Our expectations can’t be any higher than what we expect from ourselves. I mean, I bring it on, you know, I mean. Yeah, we want to win the championship, um, but in order to do that we have to become a championship team. We have to become the team that we’re trying to be, uh, we have a vision for our team of who we wanna of who we wanna be, and we believe that that vision is a is a team that the twelves are gonna be really proud of, um, but it takes time, you know, we gotta, we gotta put it together we gotta do all the work, we gotta do all the meetings we gotta do all the reps. Um, gonna make those tough decisions. I mean, there’s so many things need to happen between now and we kick it off, but that’s why I just every day is so critical. You just can’t, you can’t skip steps. Jared-Ivey, uh, Sam. He’s one of those big end type bodies that we’re trying to figure out what’s the best role for him, um, but he’s right in the thick of it. I mean, but it’s great competition, but that that role is kind of unique to us on how we utilize those guys so it fits in pretty good. You talked about Byron Murphy wanting to get more pass rush opportunities and that’s on. Do you feel like you’ve got a plan for how to get him a more pass rush? create more pass rush opportunities for our defense and he’ll be right there. I mean, not to be a smart Alec, but we have to play better on early downs to create those situations. We gotta play better complimentary football, you know, to play with the lead more, all those things as a football team where we can force teams to drop back and when we know they’re gonna, they’re gonna pass. So, um. But Murph earn those roles, you know, however it shakes out with Leo and Jay Reed and all, all the rushers, however we can, you know, put it together, um, yeah, we have a vision for him, but we as a football team, we got to create more of those opportunities for, for everybody. Oh yeah, Mike Mike, what are you most excited about seeing your offense do this year? Run off the rock, man. Yeah, I mean, yeah, we wanna play our style of ball, let the, let the old line do their thing, um, get Sam on the move, separate the defense. Uh, all those things, I mean, just, it’s fun to watch us. It’s fun to watch these guys put it together and how they drill it to go from individual to group, how it all fits together, all the rules, um. It’s really exciting. Thank you. All right, great. Thank you.

Head Coach Mike Macdonald shared his thoughts on the first day of the Seahawks’ training camp. (0:00) He expressed enthusiasm about the camp atmosphere and the team’s spirit. (1:20) Macdonald noted Kenneth Walker III’s great progress and mentioned ongoing evaluations for offensive line positions. (3:54) He highlighted his collaboration with Offensive Coordinator Klint Kubiak and their shared football focus. (6:13) Macdonald emphasized the importance of high attendance during voluntary workouts for team chemistry and execution. (10:23) He praised DeMarcus Lawrence’s exemplary work ethic in drills. (12:17) Regarding expectations, Macdonald stated the team’s goal is to win a championship while focusing on daily improvements. (14:01) He expressed excitement about the offense’s potential, particularly in running the ball effectively.

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