With one game to go, Seahawks getting healthy
RENTON – Too little, too late.
Not only are the Seattle Seahawks beginning to play well as the season winds down, they’re getting healthy, too.
Coach Mike Holmgren said Monday that several injured players who missed Sunday’s game against the New York Jets could be back this weekend.
The most notable from that group, quarterback Matt Hasselbeck, has a remote chance of playing but appears likely to sit out his ninth game of the season because of a bad back.
“I don’t think it’s realistic, but let’s see,” Holmgren said of the possibility Hasselbeck could play. “Please don’t write that he’s not going to start. I suppose there’s a chance, but give me a couple days.”
Hasselbeck has missed the last three games, during which time Seneca Wallace has gone 2-1 while compiling a 108.5 passer rating.
“He absolutely deserves to keep playing,” Holmgren said of Wallace. “But if all of a sudden Matt was healthy and wanted to play – he’s our starting quarterback and our franchise guy – I would have to think about that.
“I don’t think I’ll have to make that decision. I think it will be Seneca in the end.”
Holmgren said defensive back Jordan Babineaux (concussion) and linebackers Leroy Hill (stinger) and D.D. Lewis (bruised shin) have a good chance of playing against the Arizona Cardinals.
“So we get some guys back,” he said.
No harm done
Holmgren said the snowballs thrown from the stands at Qwest Field on Sunday were harmless because no visible damage was done.
“I know if my grandkids were up there, and there was a snowball sitting right there – and they’re good kids; they’re not mean kids – it’d be pretty hard for them not to throw it,” he said. “No one got hurt, which is a good thing.”
Fans started throwing snowballs near the end of the second quarter. When the Jets came off the field at halftime, several players scurried to put on their helmets as snowballs came raining down.
The snowballs continued throughout the second half and during the post-game celebration. One Seahawk, safety Deon Grant, said afterward that he threw a snowball back into the crowd after one nearly hit him.
Asked whether his return fire hit its intended target, Grant shrugged and said: “I hit somebody.”
At the end of the game, one Jets player was caught on film returning fire. A video circulating on Youtube.com showed defensive lineman Shaun Ellis picking up a boulder-sized chunk of snow and heaving it into a pack of fans near the visiting team’s tunnel.
When 15 yards don’t hurt
In his younger years, Holmgren wouldn’t have let a 15-yard, unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty go by without chewing out the player involved.
But his reaction to cornerback Josh Wilson’s Sunday frolic in the snow, which drew a penalty flag?
“The celebration, I thought, was pretty cool,” Holmgren said. “I didn’t see it when it happened; I saw it on television. Clearly, it was spontaneous.”
Holmgren explained that Wilson’s celebration came after the game had been decided, so the flag did not cost the Seahawks any meaningful yardage.
Donor swells Congo fund
The Seahawks announced that a fund-raiser for the nation of Congo, spearheaded by Holmgren’s wife Kathy, raised more than $47,000 on Sunday. But the coach said the figure got even higher when a big donor chipped in an unspecified amount later that night.