Seattle Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald wants his team only looking forward on the heels of a magical Super Bowl run last season.
Macdonald has been known to be deliberate in how he communicates with his team, and that has not changed with a Super Bowl ring in his trophy cabinet. He spoke to reporters on Tuesday and shared his team’s new rallying crew ahead of Seattle’s title defense in 2026.
“We’re using the term we want to ‘run it forward,’ with ‘it’ meaning our process and who we are,” Macdonald said during a press conference. “I think this is going to be a conversation, something that we’re going to talk about consistently. …
“It’s how we talk about how we operate all the time. We’re having conversations with our team and our units every day about who we want to be and how we want to do things. This situation is no different.”
Asked who came up with the tagline of “run it forward,” Macdonald had a cheeky reply.
“If you like it, I’ll take credit for it,” the Seahawks coach added. “If not, somebody else.”
It’s not uncommon for teams to have Super Bowl hangovers, which often makes it more difficult for reigning champions to get back on the main stage. The term often used by contending teams is to “run it back,” but Macdonald wants to rewire the way his team thinks to keep their competitive fire going.
Coaches are hired primarily for their game-planning and play-calling on the field. But the culture coaches build behind the scenes can sometimes be just as important.
