Three former Seahawks players and coaches are popular names in this years coaching cycle.
Many Seattle Seahawks fans will recognize some of the new coaching hires around the league. Names like Brian Schottenheimer, Nick Sorensen, and Heath Farwell have all been in the coaching news cycle this January. Pete Carroll obviously belongs on this list as well, however, his name is not a vaguely familiar name, rather he his an obviously familiar name as he was the face of the Seahawks franchise for 14 years (2010-2023).
The most notable of these three more vaguely familiar names, Brian Schottenheimer, the son of legendary coach Marty Schottenheimer, was announced as the next head coach of the Dallas Cowboys last week. The hiring of Brian has been the recent talk of many NFL circles online and in the media, mostly discussing how surprising of a hire this was. However, for those Seahawks fans who are wondering why the name sounds so familiar, that is because he was the Seahawks’ offensive coordinator for three years (2018-2020).
During those years with the Seahawks, Seattle’s offenses had three of their best seasons in franchise history, ranking 3rd (2019), 6th (2020), and 10th (2018) respectively. This success with Seattle led some to speculate that he was simply a scapegoat when was fired after 2020, and that he even could have been brought back to the Pacific Northwest as offensive coordinator this off-season before Klink Kubiak got the job.
Does the name “Nick Sorensen” ring a bell for you die hard Seahawk fans? Sorensen, who played 10 years in the NFL as a safety was just hired by Schottenheimer and the Cowboys to be their new special teams coordinator. This move comes after Sorensen spent the 2024 season as the San Francisco 49ers’ defensive coordinator. You may be wondering, where are Sorensen’s ties to Seattle? Well, Sorensen started his coaching career with Seattle as part of the 2013 Super Bowl championship team. Sorensen spent the next eight years (2013-2020) with Seattle serving many roles such as assistant special teams’ coach, defensive backs coach, and secondary coach.
Speaking about the 2013 Seahawks Super Bowl championship team, does the name Heath Farwell sound familiar? Farwell spent three seasons with Seattle (2011-2013), serving as the special team’s captain for the 2013 Super Bowl Championship team. After finishing his playing career, Farwell joined the Seahawks in 2016 and 2017 coaching special teams as an assistant. Farwell has made his way up the coaching ladder from here, earning a Special Teams Coordinator title with the Buffalo Bills in 2019, and keeping that title for now seven straight seasons (2019-2025.) Farwell, now with the Jaguars, has impressed. Enough that the new Head Coach, Liam Coen, has decided to retain and extend Farwell, who was initially hired by Doug Pederson. This is notable as most new coaches choose to bring in their own staff, including their own Special Teams coach.
Schottenheimer, Sorensen, and Farwell are just some former Seahawks turned coaches who are in the coaching news this cycle. And more are surely to come, especially with Pete Carroll’s recent hiring in Las Vegas. Don’t be surprised to see the likes of KJ Wright (defensive quality control with San Francisco), DeSean Shead (assistant defensive backs coach with the Miami Dolphins), Neiko Thorpe (former defensive assistant with Seattle through 2023), or Nate Carroll (former passing game coordinator with the Carolina Panthers) finding their ways to Las Vegas as well.