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HasselBACK Key to Seahawks Rebound
Matt Hasselbeck was one of the worst starting quarterbacks in the NFL last season. His bulging disk in his lower back was so bad last season that it actually was contributing to a knee ailment as well. The nerve from the disk not only shot down to Hasselbeck’s knee, but to all us Seahawks faithful’s hearts here in the Northwest.
The Seahawks went out and made Hasselbeck’s back feel about 40 million times better, by signing arguably the biggest free agent wide receiver on the market in T.J. Houshmandzadeh. Hopefully this year we won’t have to see Seattle’s practice squad wide receivers suiting up for starting lineup duty. Last year proved that it takes more than an impressive 40 yard time and vertical leap to make it in the NFL.Matt Hasselbeck joined KJR AM in Seattle to go over his back injury once again and the differences in offensive philosophy from Mike Holmgren to new Offensive Coordinator Gregg Knapp.
On how he’s feeling so far through training camp:
“I feel good, really good. A little tired, fatigued. Coach Mora has run a very, very hard camp. It’s been a lot harder I think than any of us thought. It’s been tough, very tough. The whole off season has been tough. We had like ninety-seven percent attendance at our off season workout program and that’s only because Olindo Mare’s a kicker and John Ryan is Canadian so those guys weren’t here the whole time. Everyone else was here. And then the OTA’s, and we kind of had some pre-OTA transition practices or meetings or talks, or whatever you want to call them. It’s been busy. This camp I think everyone kind of thought ‘ok, he (Coach Mora) likes good tempo on the field, off the field, real quick, fast.’ Well all those things are true but it’s still been long practices, a lot of hitting, a lot of pads. Very competitive.”
Hasselbeck was asked if he was confident in the diagnosis and the recovery of his back:
“I’m confident with that (the diagnosis). I think guys like Shawne Merriman are going to have something to say about it. I’m better equipped this year than I was last year, even the year before that, to handle the rigors of a sixteen game season. But this is football. There’s a chance that, who knows what could happen. It could be an ankle, a knee, a leg, a shoulder, I don’t know. There’s always a chance you could re-injure the same thing but I’m definitely prepared for the season. I got hurt in the first drive of the first pre season game (last season) and probably didn’t respect the injury the way that I should have and I just couldn’t get it to heal in the timeframe of an NFL season. It was just a bad season.”
Hasselbeck was asked the differences on offense from Holmgren’s version of the West Coast Offense to Jim Mora and Gregg Knapp’s version:
“I don’t know that that’s set in stone. Gregg Knapp is kind of installing everything we’ve got in the playbook and then he’s probably going to pair it down once we get to the season. I would imagine that you will see a lot more trick plays, you’d see a lot more runs, kind of like powerful. We (Holmgren’s offense) ran the ball a lot, but we would spread you out and run the ball and Gregg’s all about that as well but he’s had a lot of success tightening everybody down, bringing in two tight ends, a big fullback, a big tailback and a big receiver to block.”
Listen to Matt Hasselbeck on KJR in Seattle with Mitch Levy
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