Seahawks, Geno Smith must ignore media noise and treat negotiations like a business deal

Because that's what it is: Hi, welcome to Seaside Joe 1433

Let me start off by stealing a phrase from athletes who know they’re about to leave a franchise, or general managers who know they’re about to cut a player: “It’s a business.”

So I’m going to leave out the part where I respect Geno Smith as a man, though I do. I’m not going to write corny lines about how he’s a leader, the “heart and soul” of the team, and the type of guy who I want to go grab a beer with, even if in some ethereal place of existence that’s all true and matters. I like Geno Smith and I’ve been kind to Geno Smith, and that’s first and foremost because I think that unlike many of my counterparts I’ve always been real about Geno Smith.

Recall that 12 months ago, no Seahawks fan was worried about his pending free agency, 11 months ago no Seahawks fan wanted him to replace Russell Wilson or even though that was possible, and six months ago nobody on the Seahawks knew if either he or Drew Lock would be the leader and heart and soul of the team who you wanted to have a beer with.

But no matter how the following words sound to you, because someone needs to continue checking fans back into reality, keep in mind that I’ve maintained for weeks now that Geno Smith is Seattle’s 1A option for the 2023 season and that I believe that in a world of how Pete Carroll views the quarterback position, there’s little chance that the Seahawks will acquire an immediate upgrade. And because Geno has only had one season at the helm we have no way of knowing if 2023 will be better than 2022.

Or if it will be worse.

If what I write about Geno doesn’t upset you, then Seaside Joe is the right place for you. You also don’t have to accept it or agree. Many people in my position are under the impression that the goal of a content creator is that if they see a pool of say 100 untapped potential fans, that they need to behave in a manner that gives them the greatest potential to rope in all 100 of them. I don’t feel that way.

I’m perfectly okay with the idea that maybe only 10 of those 100 will be a fit for Seaside Joe content. I’m not greedy. I don’t want numbers for the sake of numbers. I only want to find and attract readers who have been looking for that Seahawks writer who says what the other Seahawks writers don’t say, or who doesn’t say what the other Seahawks writers say. If 90 out of 100 Seahawks fans think that I’m the worst, I don’t care.

I’d rather find those 10 people who are thinking what I’m thinking and wondering if anybody else is thinking it. And if there are content creators who think it, why aren’t they writing or saying it?

It could be they don’t and they don’t want to find out. Or it could be fear.

A lot of what I see being said or written about Geno Smith—nice guy, cool guy, great role model for a young quarterback—is taking advantage of the fact that Seahawks fans haven’t watched Seahawks football in a month. The further we get from experiencing the actual season, the easier it is to start painting a picture of a player in a positive (or sometimes negative) light and many people in my position are fixated on seeing athletes through rose-colored glasses.

Perhaps because there’s now such a thin veil between the fans at home who may start their own blogs or podcasts or Twitter accounts and the athletes who they cover, there’s a delusion that “If I’m really nice, this player will become my friend.”

Even simpler than that, “If I’m really nice, I’ll get more fans to follow me” because saying that a player is “THE BEST” attracts more fans than saying that one of the players on the team you like “could be upgraded”. They want 100 out of 100, they’re greedy.

I’m not greedy.

This week, it was hard not to notice how the Geno Smith news cycle has been overtly nice and it is easy to understand why: He’s participating in the Pro Bowl, he’s going on podcasts (and what do podcast hosts do? They build up how great their guests are and compliment their guests because that’s a polite thing to do), and in an ideal situation for a pending free agent, he’s standing out amongst a group of arguably the weakest Pro Bowl quarterbacks in NFL history.