Seattle Seahawks
When the Seattle Seahawks entered a football field for the first time in 1976, the 30-year effort to bring a football team to the city on the Northwest coast of the United States finally found a successful end. Thinking about the construction of a football stadium started in 1957, but Seattle only got hi NFL franchise in 1974, after the construction of the Kingdome.
The name of the new team was determined by means of a contest. Within days, more than 20,000 submissions were received, with over 1,700 different proposals. On June 17, 1975, the final decision was made: The new team was christened the Seattle Seahawks. And the new team could count on great support from its fans: After 27 days, 59,000 fans had bought season tickets to watch the Seattle Seahawks play.
The Seahawks contracted Jack Patera as their first head coach. In its first year, the Seahawks fought with the usual problems of an expansion team and only won two games. After they had changed from the NFC to the AFC after one year, their performance quickly improved and already in 1978 the Seattle Seahawks had their first season with more victories than defeats.
The strike of 1982 brought big changes for the Seahawks: Patera was fired after two games and replaced by Mike McCormack. But this man had to pass on the coaching staff to Chuck Knox already after the first season. For the Seahawks, this change paid off: For the first time the Seahawks qualified for the playoffs. Even more: After victories against the Denver Broncos and the Miami Dolphins, they surprisingly reached the AFC Championship Game. However, they lost the game to the Los Angeles Raiders.
Knox led the Seahawks to the playoffs three more times during his nine years as a coach, in 1988 he also won the first division title in team history with the team led by quarterback Dave Krieg and running back Curt Warner. A major factor in this success was also the first and only Seahawk, which has been elected to the Hall of Fame: Wide receiver Steve Largent. Considered too small for the NFL by many and dismissed by his first team, he set new standards for wide receivers. At his retirement in 1979, he held numerous receiving records.
In 1989, Tom Flores became the new head coach who could already look back on a successful career – crowned by two Super Bowl victories. But he didn’t manage to achieve something similar for the Seahawks, he finished many seasons with more defeats than victories. Flores’ successor also didn’t have more success: Dennis Erickson couldn’t achieve more victories than defeats in a single season. In 1996, owner Ken Behring tried to relocate the Seahawks to Los Angeles. When this failed, he finally sold the team to Paul Allen. Paul Allen the contracted Mike Holmgren as the new head coach, who already owned a Super Bowl ring. Holmgren had more luck and led the Seattle Seahawks to the second division title in team history in his first season.
After that, however, the rise of the Seahawks slowed down again. In 2002, they especially attracted attention off the field: Not only did they move to an elegant new stadium, but they also changed their helmet design and made the eagle look more furious. And it apparently had a positive effect: In 2005, the Seahawks reached the Super Bowl for the first time, where, however, lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers. But Eight years later they were more successful: The Seattle Seahawks reached the final once again and were able to beat the Denver Broncos 43:8 with an impressive performance.
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