Dave Boling: WSU grad Michael-Shawn Dugar hits paydirt with Seahawks book, ‘The Franchise’

Maybe 10 years is far enough into the healing process for Seahawks fans to be able to look back without rancor.

If not, you’ll want to avoid Chapter 29 of Michael-Shawn Dugar’s book, “The Franchise: Seattle Seahawks: A Curated History of the Legion of Boom Era.”

The title of Chapter 29 is “The Interception.”

If reading the I-Word made you wince, you already know as much about that play as you want to know.

Yes, it’s “3-Scat Pivot Halo,” a play the Seahawks had never previously attempted, and led to the heartbreaking loss of Super Bowl 49 to the New England Patriots on Feb. 1, 2015.

But even if you have to skip that bit, Dugar’s book is about so much more, and will likely tune up Seahawks fans for the upcoming season.

The publication (Triumph Books, Aug. 12 release) captures the rise and fall of the Legion of Boom, with all its charismatic and curious characters. It reveals ways in which so many were driven by deep grievance, perceived disrespect, and pure truculence.

Receiver Doug Baldwin wrote the Foreward, citing the culture of this era as the product of “emotion and tension.”

With success, it turned into a circus of hugely varied and volatile personalities, flourishing under the lenient rein of Pete Carroll, coach and ring-master.

What most fans want from a book like this are the fly-on-the-wall perspectives giving insider details that have been out of reach for most daily media outlets.

Dugar and the book deliver – like any of the several punches Percy Harvin unloaded on various fellow Seahawk receivers. (Those are in the book, too).

The book is the first by Dugar, a Washington State school of communications graduate of 2014. At 33, Dugar covers the Seahawks for The Athletic, and is among the group of young sports journalists in the region pushing out the news across an expanding range of platforms.

Dugar said he was asked by Triumph Books to work up a history of the Seahawks, but he had no interest in franchise stories back to Genesis, preferring to focus on the Carroll and Legion of Boom era.

Good decision. It was the golden age of franchise history, and with a degree of success distinct from other segments of the 50-year existence. And as the book details, it got wild.

“I really wanted people to understand the players beyond their helmets,” Dugar said. “I didn’t try to make anyone likable or unlikable, just to try to let it show who they are. … That was my goal, to try to take the main characters of this story and humanize them the best I could.”

Interestingly, so many of the marquee players were products of hardship and disappointment, and were fueled by grudges, or debts to be repaid.

Dugar details these, rather than focusing on the football action.

“I don’t spend too much time rehashing specific plays or games,” Dugar said. “They’re all on YouTube. They’re on social media. You don’t need a book for that. But do you really understand what made Kam (Chancellor) tick … do you understand the way Earl (Thomas) was wired the way he was … or all the moments that led up to (Richard Sherman)’s career?”

The pivot point of the book’s telling is, of course, the lost Super Bowl. The big personalities and egos that had been satisfied by winning, suddenly gave way to a flurry of finger-pointing and finger-flipping, and a decline aided by injuries and aging and disaffection.

Asked of his major surprise in the course of research, Dugar pinpointed the polarizing effects of quarterback Russell Wilson, particularly in the aftermath of the Super Bowl loss.

Some Seahawks, according to Dugar, felt that Wilson “had become a brand more than a teammate.” When Wilson returned with the Denver Broncos in 2022, he was met with strongly mixed response, reflecting the conflicting opinions.

A piece of insightful sourcing was the occasional tapping into the wisdom of Mo Kelly (vice president of player affairs) and Erik Kennedy (director of equipment). These two have been unseen pillars of the franchise – big brothers and father confessors to many of the players. It’s unlikely that many in the building have a better feel for the pulse of the team.

Every reviewer is duty-bound to pick a few nits. The title? Thirteen words and two colons? Unmanageable. Plus, the subhead tells the reader that it’s not actually about “The Franchise.”

Reflective of the times, some of the best insights come from sources other than author interviews. The first few of these felt derivative, but, as Dugar explained, these players now have their own media outlets, and they’re far more willing to recount key events on teammate podcasts, or on their own broadcasts, than they are to reporters.

Fair enough – the extent of information being more important than the sourcing.

For Seahawks fans, this was a magical time, filled with unique characters and unprecedented successes. I came away with a more complete background than I had before reading.

And after 372 pages, I wanted more.