Odd encounters/interactions with Seahawks players

[IndyHawk]

Yea that Wilson. He's not what he attempted to portray at all. An acquaintance of mine that's a journalist at Sports Illustrated was informed by Doug Baldwin years ago that the players in the locker room would refer to Wilson as CD (short for Cheese Dick) because they didn't respect him/felt he was phony, company man etc...

A lot of us think he's a phony..
He still has a few here fooled though but I love hearing details confirming
what exactly he is because that never gets old.

 

[MD5eahawks]

My wife and I had gone to a German restaurant in Port Deposit, a little known place in northern Maryland. We'd been there a few times before, but this time I had noticed two small black and white framed photos of a football game hanging in the vestibule. They weren't there the last time we went so I looked at them a little closer and saw that one was a FG formation and it was the Hawks at the Kingdome. The other was just a guy jumping in celebration. Inside the restaurant was an accordion player walking around in lederhosen. He came over to me and asked me about looking at the photos. Low and behold it was Don Bitterlich, the man that scored the very first points in Seahawks history.


Sept 26, 1976 vs SF


Sept 12, 1976 vs St Louis Cardinals
This was the Hawks first game and first points.

Don is a pretty nice guy and a professional accordion player. He resides in Philly and I see him every time I find myself at a German Festival.

 

[seabowl]

I've met a ton of ex Seahawks some cool and some obnoxious. This story isn't about me but about one of my closest friends.

He was dating a british chick for about four years (she was super toxic) and about three years in she told him she got scooped up by Russell Wilson in a Bel-Town bar.

She then signed an NDA and proceeded to get piped out. This was before all those stories broke about him making team mates sign NDAs to attend Mariners games etc with him.

Anyway they aren't together now (for obvious reasons lol) I still haze my buddy about it. Ill say stuff like watch your girl bro Russ waiting in the wings

“Scooped up“ and “getting piped out“? Sorry, but I am a little old, so can you explain what in the world those mean in English?

 

[olyfan63]

I remember mating Ken Hamlin once. He was very arrogant to say the least, but nice enough to me. But he totally blew off a bunch of other people. I believe it was a day or two later he got cracked in the head.

“Scooped up“ and “getting piped out“? Sorry, but I am a little old, so can you explain what in the world those mean in English?

Who knew there would be stories here about mating with Ken Hamlin and getting piped out?
Or was it mating with Russell Wilson and having to sign an NDA before getting piped out?

Anyway, sometime in the 80's, I was in the Pacific West Health Club in Lacey, WA. (Later became "Bally's Pacific West" and eventually shut down/sold to LA Fitness)
Just doing some weight machines, and I notice that Dave Krieg is walking around the exercise floor! I didn't say anything to him, just stared briefly, and noticed that he is an average size guy, not an NFL-size behemoth.

I met Manu Tuiasosopo and his wife briefly at some sort of IT event, a trade show thing I think. It was when Marques Tuiasosopo was the UW quarterback. Manu was much less jacked than his playing days, just trim and not bulky. Manu was dashing off right then to do something else. Manu's wife was slender and average height, and I chatted with her briefly. I just told her how awesome her son is and how great he is doing for UW. She was friendly and cordial. I didn't say it, but It was hard to see how this slender woman could have produced a big strong athlete like Marques, but I suppose it was Manu's genes.

 

[Chillax]

“Scooped up“ and “getting piped out“? Sorry, but I am a little old, so can you explain what in the world those mean in English?

Not a problem cool cat let's wind it back. They went for a little spin, parked under the stars, and did a little backseat jitterbug, if ya catch my drift.

 

[seabowl]

Not a problem cool cat let's wind it back. They went for a little spin, parked under the stars, and did a little backseat jitterbug, if ya catch my drift.

Is that when she said he’s too short?

 

[JPatera76]

Training camp in Cheney, went every year with my Grandfather everyday we could go right up until they moved it away.. I was in the middle school and I remember it was after practice and at this point I have every autograph minus 2, well they let us kids go out on the field. I went and looked for Trent Dilfer, found him talking with Coach Holmgren, so I waited patiently with my football covered with every autograph minus these two men. They were all I needed to complete another year of training camp with my grandpa! Then I could set this football up with the countless others also filled with autographs from every Seahawks team before then. (They’re all in a safe now with other family “heirlooms” lol)

Well as I waited Coach got called away to go do something, so Dilfer looked down at me and then suddenly turned and walked away. I followed and asked him politely for his autograph. He said nothing and kept walking so I asked again. This time he turned (my grandfather is watching me and waiting during this time) and i still remember it this day, he said “look you little shit, I’m not signing your damn ball now get out of here” I was a kid.. I was dumbfounded, I .. I was hurt. Not because he was my favorite or anything, but because this is my team, my grandpas team, and he represents them. I turned around and ran back to my grandpa eyes full of tears just silently crying.

My grandfather saw this and and could over hear a little of what was said, he was pissed. But he was a good man and didn’t show it. We we drove back to Spokane, he stayed quiet. And I was just wiping the tears away. We got home and I went to my room. Well the next day I got up and got ready to go to the last day of camp with my grandpa. Well when I went out to the living room my grandmother told me my Grandpa already headed out. I felt confused this time because this was a he and me thing. Well when we got home he was smiling ear to ear and didn’t say anything until that night at dinner. He pulled out is Federal Marshals Badge and set it down. Then pulled out a training camp program. He looked at it and smiled. Said, “I bet I have something you don’t!” I told him “yeah I’m too young to become a marshal!” He laughed that and then opened the program. My eyes lit up!

There they were coach holmgrens autograph (with a cool personal message) and Trent Dilfers. When I looked at those, and looked at his badge which he never carried on the weekends or off duty, I asked him why he had it and how did he get those autographs? He chuckled. I guess security let him by when he showed them his badge and he went to Holmgren and told him what Dilfer had done. lol SO Holmgren signed the program with a message wishing me good luck in my upcoming football and track seasons and to keep focused with school. And apologized to my grandpa for Dilfers behavior towards me (Pretty cool) and got Dilfers autograph.

To this day I hate that dude. I because I was so young that negative interaction almost turned me away from the Seahawks, but because my grandpa I stayed hooked.

 

[Ozzy]

Training camp in Cheney, went every year with my Grandfather everyday we could go right up until they moved it away.. I was in the middle school and I remember it was after practice and at this point I have every autograph minus 2, well they let us kids go out on the field. I went and looked for Trent Dilfer, found him talking with Coach Holmgren, so I waited patiently with my football covered with every autograph minus these two men. They were all I needed to complete another year of training camp with my grandpa! Then I could set this football up with the countless others also filled with autographs from every Seahawks team before then. (They’re all in a safe now with other family “heirlooms” lol)

Well as I waited Coach got called away to go do something, so Dilfer looked down at me and then suddenly turned and walked away. I followed and asked him politely for his autograph. He said nothing and kept walking so I asked again. This time he turned (my grandfather is watching me and waiting during this time) and i still remember it this day, he said “look you little shit, I’m not signing your damn ball now get out of here” I was a kid.. I was dumbfounded, I .. I was hurt. Not because he was my favorite or anything, but because this is my team, my grandpas team, and he represents them. I turned around and ran back to my grandpa eyes full of tears just silently crying.

My grandfather saw this and and could over hear a little of what was said, he was pissed. But he was a good man and didn’t show it. We we drove back to Spokane, he stayed quiet. And I was just wiping the tears away. We got home and I went to my room. Well the next day I got up and got ready to go to the last day of camp with my grandpa. Well when I went out to the living room my grandmother told me my Grandpa already headed out. I felt confused this time because this was a he and me thing. Well when we got home he was smiling ear to ear and didn’t say anything until that night at dinner. He pulled out is Federal Marshals Badge and set it down. Then pulled out a training camp program. He looked at it and smiled. Said, “I bet I have something you don’t!” I told him “yeah I’m too young to become a marshal!” He laughed that and then opened the program. My eyes lit up!

There they were coach holmgrens autograph (with a cool personal message) and Trent Dilfers. When I looked at those, and looked at his badge which he never carried on the weekends or off duty, I asked him why he had it and how did he get those autographs? He chuckled. I guess security let him by when he showed them his badge and he went to Holmgren and told him what Dilfer had done. lol SO Holmgren signed the program with a message wishing me good luck in my upcoming football and track seasons and to keep focused with school. And apologized to my grandpa for Dilfers behavior towards me (Pretty cool) and got Dilfers autograph.

To this day I hate that dude. I because I was so young that negative interaction almost turned me away from the Seahawks, but because my grandpa I stayed hooked.

That's a cool story though and your grandpa is a good dude for what he did! Dilfer when he went bonkers on the sidelines of the high school game he was coaching was a massive wtf for me in regards to him. Not a fan either.

 

[olyfan63]

That's a cool story though and your grandpa is a good dude for what he did! Dilfer when he went bonkers on the sidelines of the high school game he was coaching was a massive wtf for me in regards to him. Not a fan either.

Trent Dilfer... the only Super-Bowl-Winning quarterback to be CUT by his team the following training camp.

Trent Dilfer explains 'bitterness' over Ravens releasing him after Super Bowl XXXV victory

Trent Dilfer’s lone season with the Baltimore Ravens during the 2000 season saw him take the starting quarterback job from Tony Banks and help the team do just enough on offense to win Super Bowl XXXV.

www.foxnews.com

(Elvis) Grbac would join the (Ravens) team the next season and would get bounced out of the playoffs in the divisional round.

"I'll take a shot at Elvis because it doesn't bother me at all," he (Dilfer) said. "The core value of that team was toughness. And (Coach) Brian (Billick) didn't realize that. It wasn't their coaching. It wasn't their talent evaluation. It wasn't all the things that they think it was. The core value of that team was mental and physical toughness, and that's who I am and that's the opposite of who Elvis is. They set their identity back light years by getting it wrong."

OK, Dilfer was fundamentally an emotional hothead asswipe, but just tough enough to be available to QB the Ravens (and their all-time great defense) through a playoff run and to a Super Bowl win. The best ability of all is availability. Hope you never meet your heroes? Though a lot of great stories have been shared here, so, for many, it's worth the meet. Holmgren for the win!

 

[AubHawk71]

Ha! I was thinking about starting a nostagia train post during dead time before SB.

1987, I went to Do The Puyallup with my friend and his family.

We are walking from the parking lot to the Blue Gate, and lo and behold there is Jim Zorn and his family in front of us. Nobody hassled them, just the "That's Jim Zorn" whispers. Kreig era, obvs.

DIff times.

 

[AubHawk71]

Edit: Of course we had to tell all our friends at school the next day, and since we didn't get autographs they didn't believe us.

 

[jbwilm]

My parents live across the street from Rick Downs. (He played for Seattle back in the 80's.) I've talked to him a few times. He's a cool guy.

 

[Bobblehead]

Not a Seahawk, but Slick Watts.. I was on the last boat to bainbridge, 130am or something, no one was on it, except Watts and his girl friend.. I said hi, we started to talk for a bit and I got curious, because there were no more ferries back to Seattle, so I had to break the bad news. he was a little shocked, I"m not sure what he did, maybe catch a cab back around to seattle.. IDK.

 

[Hawkstud]

Back in 1993 (at 46 years old) I worked at the Everett Boings 777 building as a union Millwright installing MOP's (multi opening presses) and was pushing gang-boxes in a row for my crew, anyways, I had accidentally sandwiched this HUGE man's lunch box in between a couple of those big boxes as he tried to go between them.
That's not the funny part; this giant of a man was working as a Laborer, to which I asked him if he had a 'Double-Jack' hammer that I could use for a couple of minutes and he said no, but there was one in an Iron Workers Gang Box over yonder, I said, well, these other crafts get persnickety about any other crafts using their tools......Lunch time rolled around and this smiling giant came over and asked if I'd mind if he sat down and had lunch with my crew and I, and I said be my guest; He asked if I'd gotten my hands on that 'Double Jack' and I said "as a matter of fact I did use the on in that Iron Workers Box" and he asked me if they got angry for me using it, and I told him (jokingly) yeah, they tried giving me guff about it but I told them that If they didn't like it, they could kiss your a$$, and he and the rest of my crew roared with laughter.
Turnes out, he was a Lineman trying out for the Seahawks...Mike I think he said his name was.
What a fun time that was for me.
I didn't want to impose on him by asking him for specific's, wishing now that I'd have spent a little more time getting to know the shy & jovial guy.

 

[IndyHawk]

Training camp in Cheney, went every year with my Grandfather everyday we could go right up until they moved it away.. I was in the middle school and I remember it was after practice and at this point I have every autograph minus 2, well they let us kids go out on the field. I went and looked for Trent Dilfer, found him talking with Coach Holmgren, so I waited patiently with my football covered with every autograph minus these two men. They were all I needed to complete another year of training camp with my grandpa! Then I could set this football up with the countless others also filled with autographs from every Seahawks team before then. (They’re all in a safe now with other family “heirlooms” lol)

Well as I waited Coach got called away to go do something, so Dilfer looked down at me and then suddenly turned and walked away. I followed and asked him politely for his autograph. He said nothing and kept walking so I asked again. This time he turned (my grandfather is watching me and waiting during this time) and i still remember it this day, he said “look you little shit, I’m not signing your damn ball now get out of here” I was a kid.. I was dumbfounded, I .. I was hurt. Not because he was my favorite or anything, but because this is my team, my grandpas team, and he represents them. I turned around and ran back to my grandpa eyes full of tears just silently crying.

My grandfather saw this and and could over hear a little of what was said, he was pissed. But he was a good man and didn’t show it. We we drove back to Spokane, he stayed quiet. And I was just wiping the tears away. We got home and I went to my room. Well the next day I got up and got ready to go to the last day of camp with my grandpa. Well when I went out to the living room my grandmother told me my Grandpa already headed out. I felt confused this time because this was a he and me thing. Well when we got home he was smiling ear to ear and didn’t say anything until that night at dinner. He pulled out is Federal Marshals Badge and set it down. Then pulled out a training camp program. He looked at it and smiled. Said, “I bet I have something you don’t!” I told him “yeah I’m too young to become a marshal!” He laughed that and then opened the program. My eyes lit up!



To this day I hate that dude. I because I was so young that negative interaction almost turned me away from the Seahawks, but because my grandpa I stayed hooked.

Some players are complete dicks about autographs,
my kid brother in the 80s ran into Greg Maddux in an elevator, so excited
ect he was like 8-10 yrs old, asked Greg for an autograph, Greg started
yelling at him, turning red with near rage, scared my brother pretty bad.
Anyway, my brother no longer watched baseball, stopped collecting baseball
cards or going to games.
When I heard all this, I no longer was a Maddux fan and Hoped I'd run into
him one day because I wouldn't put up with him yelling that's for sure, I don't
care how big anyone is, it's just wrong.
It's not Seahawk related but there are pricks on every sport and team.

 

[TwistedHusky]

Knew someone that played on the team with Wilson, back at NC State. Told me some stories. Told me how Wilson came up with the whole 'do all this stuff for kids' charity and everyone will love you'. Told me plenty about who he really was and all of the cheating (even back then...weirdly his girl then was weirdly defensive/protective even knowing what kind of guy he was). Never liked him after I heard that but yes, we won a SB with him so, as I said, if someone kills people with hammers but takes us to a SB - I'm fine with it. But once he stopped producing, I couldn't stand the guy again.

Met plenty of players that are supposedly great guys that are pieces of ish. Weirdly, one of the nicest guys had a terrible reputation. Former TE for the Seahawks that everyone hated, J Stevens. (Called everyone Dog but generally a cool guy).

But Ricardo Lockette used to do a charity thing out here, even way after the SB loss when everyone was blaming him for that. He still cared and did a lot for people out here (I think it was E WA?). Giving, generally good guy. Sucks he had to take so much crap from people who blamed him for the loss. FOR YEARS. Still amazingly showed up and did events even knowing he was going to have a few pieces of crap in the crowd come to the booth and blame him again.

I also used to casually date a girl who was one of the cheerleaders, she told me stuff about what happened with the girls and some of the guys on the team (fair enough they broke the rules on that, Seahawks used to demand tons of practice time by those girls and barely paid them anything. Even when they took them on tours to the desert to visit the troops, etc. )

 

[Dolomight12]

I posted it in the gameday thread the night it happened, but on this last Christmas Eve I bumped into Ernest Jones at Walmart and got a picture. He confirmed that they were locked in and were gonna come home from Carolina with the dub. He kept his word.

 

[Dolomight12]

Also, my son is friends with Zorn's grandson and he sent my boy a signed card and photograph via his grandson. I believe I posted it on here back when it happened, but not sure.

 

[AubHawk71]

I lived in Chelan around 2009-2013 and Hass and a handful of other players had vacation spots at Sun Cove on the Columbia. Chelan is small, so you would bump into them doing normal human things in town.

Easy to spot, not a lot of large black locals in the area.

 

[AubHawk71]

I lived in Chelan around 2009-2013 and Hass and a handful of other players had vacation spots at Sun Cove on the Columbia. Chelan is small, so you would bump into them doing normal human things in town.

Easy to spot, not a lot of large black locals in the area.

I saw a player at Safeway and he had like 50 lbs of meat in his cart. BBQ time for the big boys!