Pete Carroll downplays NFC West disparity in OTA attendance

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In the ultra-competitive NFC West, the always-compete Seahawks aren’t competing like they usually do in the offseason. Is coach Pete Carroll concerned that this will cause them to slip behind the other three competitors in the division, all of whom have most players present and participating?

“I don’t manage anything on what’s going on around the rest of the league,” Carroll told reporters on Thursday. “We’re just doing what’s best for us, what our guys need to do. We’re making terrific progress, we’ve been here before with what we can get done virtually and it’s going great. Our guys are dedicated and working their butts off everywhere, all over the place and not many guys live here in the area so it’s a little bit more challenging to get guys in here early in the offseason. Other than that, whatever they’re doing, they’re doing. I don’t know what their workload is like, what their mentality is like in other places, I wouldn’t know that.”

Carroll’s mentality as it relates to the later stages of the offseason, culminating in the mandatory minicamp, is clear.

“Our activities will pick up as we get closer to minicamp,” he said. “We expect a pretty darn good attendance at minicamp, there are a couple of guys that have some special situations, but for the most part we expect most of our guys to be there. The week before is really important week as well in preparation for it. We’ll see more guys coming through as we get to the middle of June. The conversations have been open. I’ve talked to a bunch of guys. I’ve talked to our representatives, I’ve talked to Bobby [Wagner], and Russ[ell Wilson] for sure. We’re communicating on a good level about it. It hasn’t been a negotiation; it’s been a conversation about it. We’re kind of partnering in this thing to put it together so we can get what we need to get done. Right now what we’re doing is we’re preparing to get ready for camp. That’s what this is. It’s a voluntary time for us to take advantage of our opportunities. I love the way our guys are learning. I know where they are going to be mentally based on what we did last year without any offseason work. Anything that we get done here will be a bonus to that. We plan to do this really well.”

The fact remains that the 49ers, Cardinals, and Rams enjoy greater attendance during the current stage of the offseason. If the Seahawks are sluggish out of the gates when the rest of the division isn’t, many will point a finger back to May as a potential reason for the disparity.