On the run

RENTON, Wash. – The motto for this all-new Seahawks training camp – and season – echoes off the walls of the team’s opulent headquarters. It bounces off the ripples in Lake Washington that lap up to the edge of the practice fields.

New offensive coordinator Greg Knapp yells it incessantly, and loudly, drowning out the blaring music and catcalls coming from tipsy fans watching practices on boats anchored just offshore: “One cut and GO!”

The words define Knapp’s quick-hitting running game behind a zone blocking scheme, already seared into the heads of Seahawks running backs just two days into camp. It’s replacing exiled coach Mike Holmgren’s analytical, pass-first offenses that ruled the last 10 years in Seattle.

“Oh, all day. All day,” lead back Julius Jones said Saturday, when asked how often he hears Knapp’s siren call. “When I wake up in the morning, and before I go to bed.

“He’s very passionate about this scheme, and he does a really good job with it.”

Yes, he does.

Knapp’s offenses have finished in the top 10 in the league in rushing all eight seasons he’s been a coordinator. That includes from 2004-06, when he was in Atlanta under new Seahawks coach Jim Mora, and the running of Warrick Dunn, Michael Vick and T.J. Duckett led the Falcons to the NFC championship game. And last season in Oakland, when Justin Fargas and rookies Darren McFadden and Michael Bush each ran for at least 400 yards on a team that finished 5-11.

Now, Knapp’s command is reviving the Seahawks, who flopped to 4-12 last season to end their four-year reign in the NFC West. Seattle will also have a triumvirate answering Knapp’s call in Jones, Duckett and Justin Forsett, a slithery second-year flash from California.

“It fits perfectly with my style of running,” Jones said. “I’ve dropped a lot of weight in order to be quick and fast and make this one cut and get downhill.”

The 5-foot-10 Jones said he’s lost about 10 pounds, down to 212. The last time he was so light?

“My rookie year,” he said. “I had a decent year that year, so maybe this will work.”

He arrived in Seattle last year feeling snubbed by the Dallas Cowboys, who dumped him as their featured back in favor of Marion Barber. Then last season Holmgren benched Jones for fumbling and being ineffective behind an injury-depleted offensive line. He started 10 games, ran for 698 yards and scored two rushing touchdowns.

This is another opportunity for vindication.

“I’m always looking to prove myself in this league,” he said. “This is a new coaching staff, so obviously I have something to prove to them. But I’m always out to prove that I’m definitely one of the better backs in the league.

“I think every back should do that. If not, they should shut it down.”

Mora said Jones is the lead back, but that Duckett and Forsett will also get opportunities behind fullbacks Owen Schmitt and Justin Griffith, another former Falcon.

“We told him, ‘The ball is yours right now, so take it and run,’ ” Mora said of Jones. “I think he relishes in that. I think that’s what any running back wants to be told.”

Jones agrees.

“I feel comfortable, a lot more comfortable than I did last year,” he said. “The atmosphere – everything just feels better.”

Duckett said the offense is similar to the one Knapp ran in Atlanta, down to the play calls. That makes him more comfortable than he was last season, when Holmgren used him mainly as a battering ram on short-yardage and goal-line situations.

Now, that ram has wings. “Anytime my momentum is going forward, that’s a good thing,” he said.

Jones and Forsett have never had a coach emphasize hitting the hole so quickly.

“We’re going to be a balanced offense,” said Forsett, who ran behind zone blocking at California. “It’s exciting. Everybody is pumped up, ready to go.”