Marshawn Lynch stood as close to the exit as possible, watching the time click down until the Seahawks’ Media Day session at the Prudential Center in Newark came to an end Tuesday.
Dressed in a gray hoodie and wearing sunglasses, he looked like the Unabomber in a Super Bowl warm-up. He was surrounded by reporters and cameras, but ignored just about every question that came his way. Lynch, as is his custom, wasn’t interested in dealing with the media — not even at the Super Bowl. Beast Mode was on Least Mode.
“I’m just about that action,” Lynch told Deion Sanders during a brief interview for the NFL Network. “I’ve never seen talking win me nothing.”
Technically, the Seahawks running back answered questions for about 6 ½ minutes of the nearly hour-long session. Sanders also got his one-on-one as did a representative of the Armed Forces Network dressed in fatigues who was gathering shout-outs on video from players to send to the troops. Otherwise, Lynch had little to say on the day when most of the NFL doesn’t shut-up.
“At least we got 6 ½ minutes out of him,” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll, said with a shrug.
Those hoping Lynch would use Media Day to discuss his life, career and thoughts on playing in Super Bowl XLVIII, didn’t get the memo. Lynch likes the media about as much as he likes getting stopped on fourth-and-goal at the 1-yard-line.
He was fined $50,000 this month for not talking to the Seattle media. He appealed and the NFL essentially put the fine on hold, contingent on if his cooperation improved. It didn’t, though he did just enough to appease the NFL for the time being.
“Players are required to participate and he participated,” NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said. “We will continue to monitor the situation.”
While the rest of teammates were either sitting at podiums or standing in assigned areas to speak with the thousands of media that filled the floor of the Prudential Center, Lynch twice left the premises only to be persuaded to return by members of the Seahawks PR staff. But instead of going to the microphone, he stood off to the side, ignoring questions like: “How do feel?” “What do you think about the Broncos defense?” and “Are you cold?”
At one point he was asked if he was standing two steps from the exit just to avoid being fined. He nodded in agreement. How’s that for a sound bite?
Lynch had threatened to skip the entire Media Day, which players and coaches from each team are required by the league to attend. Last week before he had decided to attend Media Day, he told NFL.com columnist Mike Silver: “If you’re forced to do something, it’s not as good as if you choose to do it. So no, I won’t have a lot of interesting things to say. When you’re forced to do something and you know it, it kind of just takes away from the whole experience of what it could be if [it were] natural.”
The bizarre scene of Lynch standing in hoodie and sunglasses, whispering only to Seahawks staffers while hundreds of media stood watching him, was in contrast to cornerback Richard Sherman’s non-stop chatter about his communications degree from Stanford, his reverence for Muhammad Ali, money management, and what it would take for him to cut his dreadlocks.
“I’m going to teach him how to elaborate a little more in his interviews,” Sherman said of Lynch. “I don’t want him to get fined 50K.”
Of course, the Seahawks only care about what Lynch does Sunday against the Broncos. They feed off his tenacity. His 1,257 rushing yards and 14 total touchdowns during the regular season were essential to their success. And gaining 76 of his 109 yards in the second half to erase a 10-3 deficit against the Niners in the NFC title game is a key reason why Seattle has reached the Super Bowl.
“He fights for every centimeter on the field and he’s definitely one of the most talented runners in the game,” fullback Michael Robinson said. “He sets the tone.”
The tone he set Tuesday was mostly muted. If the Broncos would like to speak to him on Sunday, that’s not a problem.
“Game time, I’ll be there,” he told Sanders.
Any more questions?