Tempered Enthusiasm?

I have been a fan of the Seahawks from the very beginning. On a few occasions there has been a high level of enthusiasm for the upcoming season. Following the 1984 season (12-4) in which Curt Warner was injured in the 1st game, the expectations and enthusiasm were at an all time high. 1985 brought the team an 8-8 record. I believe it was the 1988 season when they went 10-6 and beat both Super Bowl participants that brought in another season with high expectations.

I don't think that I have ever been more excited for a season to begin than this next one. I am usually ready for the season to begin about 30 seconds after the completion of the Seahawks last game. Can't get enough of them! I don't believe I have ever seen a Seahawks team that is seemingly this deep and ready with quality players at every position. Most years it is a question at a few positions on how things will work out. My question to my fellow fans is this, Do we go all in with our enthusiasm and expectations or do we temper them with a little reality that it is a long season and anything can happen?

I don't want to be a Debbie downer. I am by my very nature upbeat and positive. If we go all in and then don't win it all, is the season a complete failure? Are we all gonna have the suicide hotline on speed dial? Is it a case of the higher the expectation, the farther the fall?

oldhawkfan":ay90v2mc said:

I don't want to be a Debbie downer. I am by my very nature upbeat and positive. If we go all in and then don't win it all, is the season a complete failure? Are we all gonna have the suicide hotline on speed dial? Is it a case of the higher the expectation, the farther the fall?

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Have you seen this board after a single loss?

i have realistic but high expectations. We shouldn't be worse than we were last year, we should be better. But that doesn't account for injuries or encountering other teams on the rise ala last year's Seahawks. I'm sure the Patriots fans didn't go into last year's season thinking their game vs. us would end up being a loss. Nor did the Packers fans think that playing a previously 2-win colts deam with a rookie QB fear an L there either.

I think what we are seeing here on this board is a fan-base that has always ranged in expectation level from hopeless to cautiously optimistic, and now, for the first time, we are able to justifiably shed the 'cautiously' tag and simply be optimistic. I don't think there is anything wrong with that but there needs to be some consideration for the fact that wins in the NFL don't come easy for any team.

I've been a fan since '79 and I am very stoked for this season. I think we have a real chance to make another run in the playoffs.

Check back after week four of the season and see if I am crying or not LOL!

I tried the "curbed enthusiasm" gig, and it doesn't fit with my homer mentality.
There are way too many Coaching, and player upgrades, that have worked their asses off, + they have bought in to Petes' "Rah Rah", and if they are enthusiastic?, then it's pedal to the metal, "I'm In"

I always have high expectations. You know, they kept a draft pick you really liked, or picked up a kick ass F.A.

Some years it has worked out, some not so much.

Based on last years performance we are expected to go further.

Well ladies and gentlemen, it must be earned, year in and year out. I handicap horses and like going to the races, and I can tell you that on many occasions the horse that was supposed to win doesn't even get 4th place.

So it goes here.

I'm a fan that's never skeptical and has nothing but the highest of expectations for our Seahawks. Regardless of who's on the roster, the year, who our coach is and who we're playing. I don't like to limit myself or the possibilities of our team. Why root for them from game one if you're expecting anything less than the Lombardi Trophy? Many of you will say that my ideas are not realistic and you may be right. But I can live with that. :mrgreen:

I've been a Seahawk fan since team inception. Like the OP mentioned, it's hard to get too up for a Seahawks season, because it seems like inevitably, my beloved Hawks let me down the more I expect from them. It's not like we've stunk forever like some franchises. We'll get up, then crash down. Hell, recently, I was really on the verge of not caring too much, and trying to become a more casual fan at the end of the Ruskell era. Then we hire PC and he grabs JS, we start the roster churn and turn out the most entertaining 7-9 in the history of the league.

I've never had expectations of a Superbowl before the season. Even in 2005, I figured we were a playoff lock, but still wasn't sold on a SB berth before the season. This year, I expect SB. It's scary in a way, because there is so much farther to fall. We are such a scary deep team, with great skill position players, a crushing defense, a FO and coaching staff that is never complacent; we're solid, we're creative on offense and defense....and we're YOUNG. All these guys can even get better, that's what's scary.

The league knows it too. We're the consensus pick. The other players sense it happening, and a culture is being created. FA's are coming here on the cheap; knowing they have to compete for a job and that they're not going to be the highest paid guy in the league at their spot. Guys are willing to play for value contracts to get a ring......we're the Patriots of the West now. Hell, we might even be the new Patriots.

Writing all that, I'm full circle and with the OP. I really don't know how "all in" to go. Bet your ass if I get to a game this year, I'm All In screaming my lungs out though.

The way I see it, anything can happen. We never know what a season is going to hold. We can imagine what is likely to happen and sometimes that gets it close. The cool thing about this team is that we knew what we had going into last year. Many of us had penciled in a 10-6, 11-5 season after looking at the schedule and sure enough, that is how it worked. Now there was a game or two that went the opposite way, but that is how it always is.

We had plenty of prediction lists for the season and a large number of them were very close to the pick. That is what a team like this does. Consistent at QB, in the run game and on defense. Those are tangibles that just aren't going to change. I figure we might as well have fun with it now, because it isn't going to change how this team plays. What we know is this, right now, at this time, the Hawks offense was on a tear in the second half of the season. The defense was very tough to score on with any consistency and the team did not subtract talent, they added talent to the team that was already that good. This Percy Harvin thing is going to be a big deal. The FO just gave RW, Lynch, Rice, Miller, Tate and Baldwin a major distraction to step up their game. While Harvin is getting attention like crazy, the defenses are going to have a lot of trouble with those other players.

It is going to be a great year, it would have been anyways, but now it is just going to be ShowTime. Might as well enjoy it.

I used to be this board's poster child for tempered enthusiasm. It got boring.

Basis4day":akq3q8km said:

oldhawkfan":akq3q8km said:

I don't want to be a Debbie downer. I am by my very nature upbeat and positive. If we go all in and then don't win it all, is the season a complete failure? Are we all gonna have the suicide hotline on speed dial? Is it a case of the higher the expectation, the farther the fall?

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Have you seen this board after a single loss?

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I'll take it one further; have you seen this board after an interception or fumble? Hell, after an incomplete pass?

Basis4day":1aloej9v said:

oldhawkfan":1aloej9v said:

I don't want to be a Debbie downer. I am by my very nature upbeat and positive. If we go all in and then don't win it all, is the season a complete failure? Are we all gonna have the suicide hotline on speed dial? Is it a case of the higher the expectation, the farther the fall?

Click to expand...

Have you seen this board after a single loss?

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You beat me to it hahah

Am I stoked for the season to start? Yes.

Do I hope we bring home the Lombardi? Of Course.

If we don't win it all, am I going to consider this season a failure? No.

razgriz737":stu56oe4 said:

Am I stoked for the season to start? Yes.

Do I hope we bring home the Lombardi? Of Course.

If we don't win it all, am I going to consider this season a failure? No.

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:th2thumbs: Pretty much sums it up.

I have this "off" feeling about this year as well. One injury to RW, and we are done. If it is early, we could be challenging for Clowney. We are that dependent on one player.

Scary.

nbk35zw":nczcpb9y said:

I have this "off" feeling about this year as well. One injury to RW, and we are done. If it is early, we could be challenging for Clowney. We are that dependent on one player.

Scary.

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No we're not, we went 7-9 the year before with Tarvaris Jackson, who was injured half the time. We could be the 2008(ish) Patriots; lose RW and go 11-5. I said could be. We need to find a real backup QB.

We have a legit shot at winning it all so that's what I'm wired for.

I'll be going ballistic if we lose a game in the closing seconds because of BS soft defense though no matter what our record. That's my boiling point.

I never get too up or down anymore. It is sports. It is fun, and man I hope they win the big one soon, but I'll never let it get to me to the point where it affects the way I am in the rest of my life.

I'm pumped, don't get me wrong. I love football and I love this group of players and coaches. I will get really excited when they win and it will suck when they lose, but I just enjoy watching and rooting at this point. I'm along for the ride.

2005 was the ride I waited my whole life for. I now know what it feels like to be good enough to win a Super Bowl. We accomplished 99% of what I wanted to feel. If we hadn't done that, I'm sure I would be more crazy with anticipation.

We're going to be in the hunt more often than not for the next several years, and more often than not it is going to be a fun ride. I'm more thankful for that than I am into winning the one game at the end of it all to be brutally honest.

Basis4day":3mdjwf76 said:

oldhawkfan":3mdjwf76 said:

I don't want to be a Debbie downer. I am by my very nature upbeat and positive. If we go all in and then don't win it all, is the season a complete failure? Are we all gonna have the suicide hotline on speed dial? Is it a case of the higher the expectation, the farther the fall?

Click to expand...

Have you seen this board after a single loss?

Click to expand...

Eight and Eight... AT BEST!!!!

Hawks46":1de6edx7 said:

I've been a Seahawk fan since team inception. Like the OP mentioned, it's hard to get too up for a Seahawks season, because it seems like inevitably, my beloved Hawks let me down the more I expect from them.

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I disagree. It's very easy to get "too up" for a Seahawks season! It just makes the back-to-earth process taste a little worse when it happens.

This is the time of year for optimism to overflow anyway. But that said, we are on the brink of something we haven't seen before as Seahawk fans, at least not since about '83-'84. And I for one am going to ride the wave as high as I possibly can! My enthusiasm is completely untempered! It's possible for us to put up 19 50-burgers this season, until it isn't. We can make the '72 Dolphins look like a high school JV team, and make the Digits look like the Vikings.

With this year's Seahawks and the 12th Man in the Clink, it's possible to not allow any team to score in double digits at home, and even put up three or four shutouts. We are that good, and I am that stoked.