Marshawn Lynch spent most of his NFL career ducking questions and avoiding microphones. Now he\u2019s building a media career that operates entirely on his own terms, without ever committing to the traditional retired-player path of landing behind a studio desk.<\/p>\n
Lynch made his position clear when asked about the possibility of working on NFL studio shows. He\u2019s not interested in trading his current freedom for the constraints that come with regular television commitments.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m good where I\u2019m at,\u201d Lynch said<\/a>. \u201cI like what I got going on. I have the freedom to move around the way that I like to. It just helps me staying in the game without actually having to be in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n That freedom has allowed Lynch to carve out one of the more unusual media careers in recent memory.<\/p>\n He\u2019s working NFL sidelines as a credentialed photographer<\/a>. He\u2019s called Slamball playoff games on ESPN<\/a>. When College GameDay visited Cal, Lynch put Kirk Herbstreit in a headlock<\/a> because Herbstreit was the lone analyst picking Stanford over Virginia Tech.<\/p>\n Amazon figured out how to harness Lynch\u2019s unpredictability without trying to contain it. The network created \u201c\u2018N Yo\u2019 City<\/a>\u201d segments for Thursday Night Football that let Lynch explore whatever city is hosting each game. He plays football with kids in Chicago one week, feeds alligators in New Orleans the next. The segments run three to four minutes, giving Lynch enough time to be himself before disappearing until the next assignment.<\/p>\n Lynch has also launched two podcasts that reflect his eclectic interests. Politickin<\/a> pairs him with California Governor Gavin Newsom, while Da Get Got Pod<\/a> reunites him with former teammate Mike Robinson. He\u2019s producing a Seahawks documentary<\/a>, appeared in \u201c80 for Brady<\/a>,\u201d and somehow ended up with a role on \u201cEuphoria<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n The approach works because it acknowledges what Lynch brings to media while avoiding the pitfalls that would neutralize his appeal.<\/p>\n Most retired players follow a predictable trajectory from the field to coaching to eventual media roles that demand consistency and availability. Lynch built something else entirely, maintaining the same selective approach to media obligations that defined his playing career. He can work on projects that interest him, collaborate with people he chooses, and walk away when the assignment ends.<\/p>\n The studios will always be there if Lynch changes his mind. But he\u2019s already found something better, which is a media presence that doesn\u2019t require him to become someone else to fit someone else\u2019s format. Lynch figured out how to stay in the game without actually being in the game, exactly like he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Marshawn Lynch spent most of his NFL career ducking questions and avoiding microphones. Now he\u2019s building a media…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":379814,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2081],"tags":[7,311,6,238,237,261,2635],"class_list":{"0":"post-379813","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-seattle-seahawks","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-marshawn-lynch","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-seahawks","12":"tag-seattle","13":"tag-seattle-seahawks","14":"tag-seattleseahawks"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115230045964175829","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379813\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}