Lynch’s comments bring to light a disconnect Seahawks must address

Marshawn Lynch's said he would have been "the face of the nation" if he'd been handed the ball on the final play of the Super Bowl, hinting that he may believe the Seahawks coaches schemed against him. (AP)

The media has been buzzing about Marshawn Lynch’s comments about the Seahawks’ final play of the Super Bowl, but it isn’t just the fact that he expected to be running the ball on that play that is creating conversation.

Lynch talked to a Turkish sports network about the play over the weekend, and it’s the subtext of one particular quote that is ruffling feathers.

“When you look at me, and you let me run that ball in … I am the face of the nation. You know, MVP of the Super Bowl … that’s pretty much the face of the nation at that point of time,” Lynch said to a NTV Spor reporter. “I don’t know what went into that call. I mean, maybe it was a good thing that I didn’t get the ball. I mean, you know, it cost us the Super Bowl.”

Was Lynch hinting at a possible conspiracy to prevent him from scoring the winning touchdown and taking the Super Bowl MVP trophy? Mike Salk of 710 ESPN Seattle’s “Brock and Salk” thinks so, and that it’s a sign of a strange disconnect between the players and the coaching staff in Seattle.

“The fact that (the players) are so willing to be swayed into that option is the problem,” Salk said on Monday’s program regarding a conspiracy theory potentially harbored by some Seahawks. “That’s the issue – not whether or not the Seahawks meant to do this … To sit here and argue over and over again, ‘Oh Marshawn, what were you talking about? You know that can’t be the case,’ is so beyond the point. The point is they got an issue to deal with.”

That issue isn’t a new one, either. Rumors of discord in the locker room were prevalent as the team struggled near midseason, and while the team appeared to patch things together in time to make an NFC championship run, the controversial decision that resulted in the interception that cost them the Super Bowl has apparently brought the ill will back to life. And now the franchise has to address it.

“One of the biggest things they’ve got to deal with is the fragile peace that seems to exist in that locker room right now. It clearly got out of hand for a while last year, came back into the normal range after the Earl Thomas speech after the loss to Kansas City (in Week 11), and clearly something happened in that final play (in the Super Bowl) that broke apart that peace,” Salk said. “Because if they honestly believe that this lunacy is the way that the coaching staff was thinking, then there’s a problem. And I don’t know what Russell Wilson does about that, I don’t know what Pete Carroll does about that, and I don’t know why Marshawn Lynch, Earl Thomas or anybody else who seems to feel that way is moving in that direction, but they sure seem to be. It’s crazy.”

The discussion begins at the 3:09 mark of the first hour of Monday’s “Brock and Salk” show. You can listen to it here.