Awesome opportunity. UH, We've got a chance to sit down with UM, you know, representative of Congress and and really just UM. You know, the goal was one to express, you know, our concerns for our own communities and this country when it comes to UM race relations, relationship between the community and police, as well as UM criminal justice reform.
And what and we wanted to do was learn, you know, what is it that they're doing on Capitol Hill already to UM to make some changes for that or better that, And what are some things that might be in development UM that are coming UM down the road that they're working on. And also how does this new administration with with Trump affect all of the things that have been in place and that are you know, we're trying to do.
And then we also want to know two things, how could we support what they're doing in their efforts to to better those relationships and get advice on what we can do UM as individuals in our own communities to really make an impact UM from a legislative standpoint UM. And obviously with all the politics that go on with that. And so it was an opportunity for us to be heard, but also an opportunity for us to listen to what's going on, to learn some things, learn how the process works, um,
and we thought that the message was well received. We got to talk to people on all sides of the table with the Democratic Republican m the CBC, and and and got a chance to hear from some reps from the Obama administration. So it was a good day. It was a full day, obviously a lot of information, but I thought we we left feeling feeling pretty optimistic and feeling um well informed. What makes Seattle, in your mind,
such a difficult place to play? I mean, the volume is obviously one of the toughest things for offensive functioning, is just it's allowed as hell. And then their defense is obviously at the top of the league, and it seems like every year. So when you're at home, your defense play as well. Is that's what feeds the crowd. The crowd feeds the defense, and it just gets worse
as the game goes on. So you have a really good defense, you usually have a really good home crowd, and I don't think I've won there in my career, so I'm looking forward to changing that. This week. Is definitely a tough place to play, but it's also I can imagine one of a good place to win as well, just as high as they are most categories higher. And so as a defense, do you think the Eagles defense should be kind of mentioned alongside Seattle? Need whatever people
are about the best defenses in the leagues always Seattle. Well, I think if you look at their defense on what they've done over the last um, you know, a few seasons there, they've been at the top of the league for a while now, UM, and what they do is it's pretty special. They have, you know, UM, a ton of Pro Bowl guys. Um, they've been doing it for it. Like I said, a long time, we're a new group, and this is our first year together, new coordinator, new names,
new faces, UM. But we're trying to earn our our place, UM in this league. We think we're up right up there with the best defenses in this league. UM. But that's this year. And so depending on the context. UM. You know, if if you want to talk about the body of work, I wouldn't compare us to um, the Seattle defense. I got a lot of respect for for the guys on that team and that defense. UM, But if you want to talk about this year, there's no defense in this league that I wouldn't compare us to UM.
And I think, you know, it's as a competitor. I don't know many people that that wouldn't have that attitude. You know, I don't know. I've never won there, but uh, I think you got to compete, man, You can't. You can't make mistakes UM because they're they're a patient team. They don't try to. If you look at them offensively, they're middle of the pack in almost every category except for one, and that's turnovers UM, which means that they're patient.
They take care of the football UM. Defensively, they know they'll make a play and keep them in a game UM. And then all they need to do on offenses take advantage of opportunities that show up. And so sometimes you might see the offense look super slow, they don't come up with anything. Then the next game you see Russell Wilson throwing for three fifty and three touchdowns. Uh. They do, you know, whatever they need to do to win UM. But if the game gets tight, there completely comfortable with
a zero to three type of game UM. And so when you go there, you have to be ready for those type of games that it's gonna be grinding them out. It's gonna be um basically coming down to who makes um the first mistake or the last mistake. UM. And it's always on their side because they have the crowd, they have the momentum. So it's a tough place to go. You gotta be patient, you gotta um come with the mentality for it to be a four quarter fight that
you know might be three yards in the cloud or dust. Um, but you gotta comfortable in that kind of situation. I mean, he's a great athlete. You know, he's he's BIG's fast. It catches the ball well, um. You know, anywhere is catch radius is probably his number one weapon. Wherever you put it around him, he can he can go get it. Obviously with a basketball background, he knows how to use his size and his body. Well the box you out
or go up and get the ball. Um. You know, he knows how to find the open spaces in the defense too. I think that's probably one of his best attributes as well. Is he might not run, you know, a precise route, or he might not create separation with the route, but if you're in the zone or if you're in the man he's gonna find just some open space and all the quarterback has to do is put the ball around him. Um. And you know, when he's healthy,
he's you know, at the top of this league. And when it comes to tight ends depending on health, it's it's the oldest and pretty roos. How do you guys survive? Uh, whoever that is gonna have to show up and you know I have to play. Just no, there's no way around it. We don't want to um change our entire defense too to babysitting anybody. UM, So we're gonna as much as we can um lean on them to compete
and step up to the plate. Um. You know, hopefully we can have everybody healthy, but if not, you know, I think we're fully prepared to to go into this game with any of the young guys that we got. UM. You know, hopefully we can do a good job of preparing them this week so that you know, if they do have to play, they're completely ready, completely prepared, and we not only we, but they feel confident going out
there and um performing. Frustrating or baffling is the home road disparity for you guys, It's not really not that frustrating. I mean, if you look at every every game, there's no game we've been in this year where we felt like we couldn't have won. Um, they're all tight. So you know, if we were getting blown out on the road, I've been and I've been on teams where we can win all our home home games and for whatever reason, on the road, we just get destroyed. You know, that's
that's frustrating. Um, But you got to understand that the marginal ror in this league is very very slim, and so especially on the road. So one or two players here there that we need to figure out how to come up with, or one or two players that that we kind of inflict damage on our own selves and and we need to figure out how to eliminate those mistakes so that we can come out of a close row game would win and and so I think we're
right there. Um, Obviously we figured that out at home, and it's what better way to kind of correct those mistakes by you know, going in one of the toughest places in this league and get to win. Statistically, guys are ranked sixth defensive way and Seattle's Life Dessert or what do you read that. I don't know we're not playing the Seattle defense this year. I mean, I think if you if you're asking me about any defense in this in this league, I feel like we can compare UM.
You know, I got a lot of respect for what they do UM and what they've done over over a period of time period, you know, a few seasons, So everybody at work is obviously UM or a sample size is a lot bigger than done it for a lot longer, had a lot of success. They got a bunch of pro bowled players on every level of their defense. And we're a defense that's trying to earn the respect of the league, trying to make a name for ourselves this year.
But that being said, if you, if you want to talk in the context of this season, there's not a defense that I wouldn't compare us to. Russell hasn't run that much this season because of some injuries he's had to his knee and an ankle, But in past years, how big a threat has his ability not just to scramble and extend plays but also pick up first downs his legs. How difficult is that for defense to deal with. I mean, so anytime you get a mobile quarterback, it
changes the entire approach to the game plan. You always got to account for that eleventh man. You gotta account for his ability to scramble. Um. You got to account for his ability to extend plays, which put stress on your secondary And so your rush has to be disciplined. But it can't be you know, two reserved because you still got to get pressure. UM. You can't spy all the time because their receivers are good enough to get open against one on one coverage. So it presents it
presents a lot of a lot of issues. And you know, that's what makes Russell Wilson special is that even if you cover everybody up, you know, he does a good job of, you know, stepping out of sacks, extending plays and and and that's where all of his big plays come is off of those um extended plays where he's just creating things UM. And his his ability to kind of add live UM is obviously one of his strong suits last year. Yeah, I mean, if you you know most teams, you know, if you try to make him
beat you with his arms, he can do that. He's not you know, it's not like he can't throw the football. UM. He's able to read defenses he's able to get the ball in and out of his hands. UM. And he's got playmakers. You know, Doug Balling is probably um one of the more underrated receivers out there. UM. But he does nothing but perform and produce UM. And they got guys in the outside, UM lock it on the inside who you know, can break a game open at any
point in time. So you know, he's got weapons that if if you want to turn it into a timing passing game, he can do that as well. UM. Now, I think the most his most devastating attribute is probably his legs. But he's very comfortable and just you know, taking a three step dropping getting rid of you know, with you and Ronnie, do you do you kind of look at their safeties. It's kind of a measuring stick
at all, Like is that something you guys aspire to be? Yeah, I mean I think so if I think if I know, for me, if if you ask me, you know, who's the best fifty tantum uh in the league or who's been the best over the last few seasons, I would say Earl Thomas and camp Chancellor. And so with this being man and Rodney's first year, UM, you know we
want to be in that conversation. And so when you have games like this, it's it's fun to be able to UM, you know, be on the same field and and kind of necessarily measure itself but UM, but but compete, and you know it's this is this, this has been our goal, you know, all years, to be the best tandem on the field whenever we go out there. And you know, this is a really good tantem that that we'll see this week that our offense will have to
deal with UM. And obviously, you know, we're trying to make UM the same you know, or accomplish the same things that they've already done over the last few seasons that they've been together. And it's been impressive. And like I said, I think me and Rodney are trying to start something here in Seattle. UM was there. Describe what it's like to play there as an opponent and maybe you know, you have a rookie quarterback when you have
a conversation, when you have a Carson UM. I'm probably gonna talk to Carson about it unless you ask me, but it's it's definitely a frustrating place to play, UM, especially if you're not you know, mentally ready to just persevere from start to finish, because that's really what it's going to be. Rarely do you go in there and just you know, have a great day. You know it's gonna be a tough UM environment. It's gonna be loud. You know they're gonna be dancing around, they talk trash,
they have fun. If you make a mistake, it gets worse. And it's some one of those things where you've got to go in with the mindset that you know you you are going to hit UM some trouble. You got to persevere through it, and you gotta be ready to fight, regardless of what the game looks like, regardless of how successful unsuccessful you are, just keep swinging away. And I think the last Yes, last year I was with the
same as we played them twice. UM. First was on a Monday night game and they flat out destroyed us and we had no chance from start to finish. And I remember the second time going up there, it was the playoff game, and we really went up there with no real intentions to UM worry about winning or losing. We're just gonna go fight and see what happens. And I think that game ended up being a little bit closer. We competed a lot better, but um, you know, they
were the better team. But that's that's kind of the mentality that you have to have when you go up there, have confidence in yourself, knowing that you can you can compete. But you gotta know that there's gonna be sometimes in the game where their crowd is gonna be loud, their defense is gonna be flying around, They're gonna make some plays. You just gotta continue to block out the noise and and and stay focused on the tasking hand, keep chipping away,
keep fighting. A quick non football question, Malcolm, I don't know if you sell the comments by Capa Nick and Mike Evans about why they didn't vote in the election. If you did, I was curious if you had any reaction to it. Um. I mean, I feel like everybody has there. I didn't see Mike's comments, read a little bit on on Kaepernicks, but I didn't see all of them. But you know, everybody has their right to vote or
not vote. Um, But I think it's important to especially when you talk about sending a message to the generation behind us, our youth. It's important, especially when you want to change something to use your your voice and your right to have input in that change. And even if it's not for a presidential candidate. UM, there's a lot of things that happened that you have to vote on for your state, your community, and things that directly affect the people that are in the community that you live in.
And so I think it's important and you know, it's good to remind people as well that even if you don't like any of the candidates that are on the ballot, there's always that blank line that you can write something in UM. And so it's it's important to you know, I want to send a message to to the kids that you know, you have a voice, and this is
how you can directly input, UM, what's going on around you. UM. You know, because people are fought for our rights to be able to vote, and that's that's you know, one of the main rights of being an American is that you have the ability to UM weigh in on on UH, whatever's going on in the country.