Walk past the office of the head coach and the music you might hear blasting could be The Doors or James Brown or even Snoop Dogg.
“He’s just out there,’’ Seahawks center Max Unger said. “He’s awesome.’’
See the head coach, Pete Carroll, wearing receivers’ gloves, firing the football 50 or 60 yards before practice, or before games, as if he doesn’t have a care in the world.
“It’s kind of hard to have a bad day with coach Carroll because every day you show up he’s going to bring something new to the table,’’ receiver Golden Tate said.
Listen in before a meeting inside the team’s vast auditorium and hear the unmistakable thud, thud, thud of a basketball hitting the floor, a precursor to the daily shooting competition Carroll gleefully orchestrates.
“Right away,’’ Seattle general manager John Schneider said when asked when he noticed Carroll had a slightly goofy side to him.
Heaven forbid the Seahawks beat the Broncos in Super Bowl XLVIII, as it will end the time-tested notion an NFL head coach must look and act a certain serious, stoic way.
Carroll, on Thursday morning, dressed in a hooded sweatshirt favored by teenagers far and wide, anticipating a great practice that afternoon, exclaimed, “We’re gonna have a really rockin’ day today!’’
Who talks like that? Maybe some young coach in his first gig, but Carroll is 62 years old, the second-oldest head coach in the NFL after the Giants’ Tom Coughlin, 67. There are some lines on Carroll’s face and he doesn’t look like a kid, but his slightly tousled hair, sing-song speech pattern and boyish impishness make it seem impossible he is as old as he is.
“Second oldest and first ugliest,’’ chided left tackle Russell Okung. “I’m just playing. Yeah, it doesn’t even seem that way. He’s a kid out there and he’s really enjoying the game and we do too.’’
Carroll, after flameouts with the Jets and Patriots, is giddy with anticipation at proving the overwhelming success he had at USC — two national titles — can finally translate to the play-for-pay ranks. His style is, well, just different, energetic to the max, relentlessly supportive, rah-rah, if you will. That’s great out there in the collegiate scene on the West Coast, but considered too congenial and touchy-feely to win amongst the big boys of the NFL.
Carroll insists he always had this vision of how he wanted to coach, but he repeatedly was told it wouldn’t work and advised to knock it off.
“I tried when I was about 24 and the coaches yelled at me when I was an assistant on staffs,’’ Carroll recalled. “They thought I was crazy trying to do what I was trying to do. I thought I was wrong because they told me I was.’’
And now he’s determined to show he’s right, that his startling success at USC can translate into the first Super Bowl victory in Seattle’s franchise history. It is no wonder the Seahawks put on display so many disparate personalities, as Carroll fosters individual expression.
“He doesn’t want us to be robotic,’’ Tate said. “I think the personalities kind of make this team. You know Pete doesn’t have a normal personality. He’s a very excited, upbeat coach.”
Carroll has installed terms such as “Competition Wednesday’’ and “Turnover Thursday’’ to send a clear message what he wants the focus to be on those days. He puts together shooting contests and there’s a hoop in the front of the team meeting room. Carroll loves basketball and frequently the Seahawks watch NBA or college hoops highlights before getting down to business.
“I don’t think he has too much pressure on us,’’ linebacker Bobby Wagner said. “He likes us to be loose.’’
Carroll appeared bemused this week as questions from one interview session after another delved into his unusual methods.
“It’s interesting to hear so many ways to explain it — laid back, freewheeling, doing whatever,’’ he said. “We run this program with extraordinary standards in how we prepare every day, with expectations that they’re going to be working their tails off every single step of every single practice. When we get in games, it’s not a different situation for us.’’
The blaring tunes of choice during Thursday’s practice — that’s right, during practice — were from Jay Z and the hip-hop group Fort Minor. “Fun atmosphere,’’ defensive end Cliff Avril said.
“I know,’’ cornerback Walter Thurmond said, “a lot of teams aren’t listening to music.’’
How very fitting for the coach who dances to his own beat.