Head Coach Mike Macdonald: "I'm Proud Of Our Style Of Play"

Mike Macdonald (0:00)

All right, good to see you, everybody.

Back at it today, and then guys will be off tomorrow, and we'll use our extra day on Wednesday. And then Thursday will be Wednesday.

SPEAKER_2 (0:16)

So what happens, Wednesday?

Mike Macdonald (0:19)

We're working through the final details, but it'll be more of a recovery day, more football won't be on the field, but the guys will be in some capacity.

SPEAKER_3 (0:29)

Coach, in the last 30 years, Seahawks haven't had a four-game stretch that was as negative offensively as the previous four games that then turned in as positive as the one you. So this is the only second time in the last 30 years that's happened.

SPEAKER_2 (0:43)

What?

Mike Macdonald (0:43)

That they were playing bad and then they played good?

SPEAKER_3 (0:45)

Yeah. It was actually the Beastquake game. So it's not easy to turn around an offense that's not doing that well.

What do you think was the key factor for you guys in being able to get things right away?

Mike Macdonald (1:02)

I just think, I think you just have to look at it through the lens of we're on a this year's, this team's version of our journey. And so, you know, what are we doing to find solutions to where we want to go?

I thought we've done some really good things at the first quarter of the season. I would say the takeaways leave something to be desired, but I think also like a function, hey, you're going from a Sunday night to a Thursday night. It's a quick turnaround. Didn't actually get the returns we wanted. Didn't necessarily have the ample opportunity to really dive in. And so, trying to make the best of the extra time.

It's also like, look, we're trying to, I mean, we're doing the same thing on defense. Maybe not to the same degree, because we have such familiarity with our staff and our players. But you're always, you're always honing in on what you do, how you do it throughout the year on really, you know, what your team's kind of calling card and identity is going to be. And so I think that's the process we're going through. Excuse me. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_5 (2:10)

There were a lot of impressive numbers, though, on offense. What are the one or two that you want to see just kind of continue to carry on in the coming weeks?

Mike Macdonald (2:19)

I think I'm proud of our style of play.

Watching us just play the game, felt like our looked like us. And there's some things operationally that we're still chasing that got us behind the sticks. Red zone, you know, we weren't able to finish those drives off, which that's going to be a, that's definitely a point of emphasis. But I think where we focused our attention, that's what came to life. Operation, style of play, run game, third down. I don't know, you know, I'm not a big stat guy. I just, I'm going off of what we saw on tape. And, you know, that was, it felt like, it felt more our style of ball.

SPEAKER_6 (2:58)

What stood out to you most about the defensive effort when you went back and looked at it?

Mike Macdonald (3:01)

I think the same thing, like, in order to, we felt like, you know, at our best, we're waves of defense. There's going to be mistakes, that's football. Like, it's never going to be perfect, but how we play on it, you know, like talking about playing off one another, having each other's back, 12 is one. I thought that was, that was impressive, man. The guys, the guys play extremely hard.

SPEAKER_4 (3:24)

Mike, when your teams had extra time, we had the bye week, the mini bye, you performed really well. The teams performed really well. What have you learned in maybe the three years as a head coach how to utilize extra days, like you have one extra day this week? What do you guys focus most on?

Mike Macdonald (3:40)

Funny to say that I immediately thought of the Tampa game last year. I think that was coming off a Thursday game.

SPEAKER_5 (3:46)

Since then. Thanks.

Mike Macdonald (3:53)

It only takes X amount of time to get ready for a game. So how you allocate the rest of the time is important.

But when we've overdone it, we've probably gotten mentally taxed. And the week is drained. And that's really just the solution for us. So that's kind of the philosophy that we've been going off of. So is it off of self scout? Is it for recovery? Is it skill development? Do we need to get away from each other? You know, I just try to make the best decision for our team on how to use that time the best.