Getty Images
This week, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll featured a photo of former Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson regarding past “resistance” to wearing a bracelet. Lost in the back and forth between Carroll and Wilson (who responded by pointing out that they had won a lot of games without Wilson wearing a bracelet) overlooked a key fact.
During his last game with the Broncos, Wilson wore a bracelet.
It was the first game of the year where Wilson opted for the prop. Coincidentally (or not), Wilson opted to go with the bracelet a week after missing a game through injury and his replacement, Brett Rypien, used one.
“We’ve looked at everything and thought about everything we can do to help our process, help our offense, do whatever we need to do,” coach Nathaniel Hackett told reporters earlier this week. “Will that be the reason we win or lose the game, looking back to the Jacksonville game, I don’t know. We always want to assess everything and try to find a way to improve. If that’s going to help us improve, so we want to do that.
Hackett was also asked if Wilson resisted wearing a bracelet.
“No,” Hackett said. “It was just one of those things that we collectively decided as a group that would help us.”
So that means Wilson will be wearing a bracelet every week, right? This is where things got a little weird.
“It might be,” Hackett said of whether the bracelet will stay in place. “I think for us, if it helps, then why not use it? Right now we’re 1-0 with that. I mean, hey, let’s move on. Again, a lot of quarterbacks use it all over the league. It’s one of those things, if it gives you an advantage or helps you, then we want to do whatever we can.
Why not “yes” or “hell yes”? The advantages are obvious. Chris Simms explained them on a recent episode of Live PFT.
Above all else, Simms said he’s streamlining the play call process. Instead of spouting out what can be a very long play name and then having the quarterback rehearse in the squad, the coach says: “27”. The quarterback then goes to play number 27, and he calls that play. Beyond the benefit of efficiency, nothing is lost in the translation from coach to quarterback.
Hackett said similar things when discussing the situation with reporters, and he cited another key factor.
“There are several different things,” Hackett said. “As a game designer, sometimes you want to be a little creative and these things can get a little wordy. You want to have it so it’s easier, instead of having to call it and then communicate it. There’s a whole process from when I give it to him, to when he has to process it, to when he has to go in. Sometimes we kinda elaborate these things because sometimes we try to become a little crazy. So it allows you to do that. I think it also helps with crowd noise. If you have crowd noise, if he listens to me, he just has to hear a wristband number, then he can come in and communicate with the guys properly.There are a lot of different things it’s good for.
Thus, everything is more and nothing less to have a bracelet. So why didn’t Wilson wear a bracelet early in the season?
“It’s a relationship thing to the extent that we operate as an offense,” Broncos offensive coordinator Justin Outten said. “You look around the league and sit there thinking, ‘Well, how late are we in game clocks? How do you do certain things at the start of the season? How can we help that?’ We are always digging and trying to find things that help us.
It’s still odd that they didn’t identify the lack of a wristband long before week seven, when Rypien wore one. It should have been one of the first things the Broncos identified after Week 1, when they struggled to play before the game clock hit zero. At the latest, that should have happened after Week 2, when the Broncos added Jerry Rosburg – the coach who coaches the coach.
There’s no reason Wilson can’t have it today. Even if he just says “Let’s Ride” over and over (Josh Alper came up with that one), the presence of the device prevents his absence from becoming an issue.
#Russell #Wilson #wearing #bracelet #today #ProFootballTalk