With Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald and his wife Stephanie expecting the birth of a child, Leslie Frazier steps in

That’s because Frazier, who spent a season in Baltimore as a secondary coach while Macdonald was a young assistant just starting out, has enjoyed the experience of watching Macdonald grow in his first year as head coach.

“It was great to see him mature in April when we had our first team meeting and to see him develop and grow as a coach, serving as head coach and also taking care of our defense.” Frazier said. “The way the guys responded to his leadership style was really, really good. His commitment to knowing when to throw in some humor and show them his personality, coupled with the ability to be strict when he needs to be and demanding at the same time.” At the same time, it was great to see him and our team have grown, but also to let the boys be themselves.

“I was just watching Mike and seeing him today compared to, say, seven years ago when we were both in Baltimore together. Back then he was always attentive to details, but he was a little quieter than he is today. And now I see him letting it happen.” He shows his personality a little more and is as detailed as he can be sometimes, as animated as he can be – you probably don’t see that side of him, but our players do already – it’s really nice to see him show his personality because one of the things you have to be careful about is someone who can handle a lot mentally. You want to be able to continue to build a relationship with the players and communicate in a way that allows you to be at your level and be at their level and not talk over their head. As hard as he works, gathering information, but then passing that information on to players is an art. There are many people who know a lot, but don’t communicate it to the players. So what’s the point? I was just really impressed with that side of him, his ability to make it clear to the players what they need and be as detailed as possible while still being able to communicate it in a way that they can understand. I was just very, very impressed with it.

And although Macdonald and Frazier discussed a lot about the big picture since he doesn’t meet with the media regularly, Frazier also commented on Sunday’s game, in which the Seahawks overcame several early mistakes and fell from a 14-point deficit to come back and claim They secured their third win in a row.

“Really good game from our team yesterday, just a great win,” he said. “We were in our team meeting probably 30 minutes ago just talking about the endurance and resilience of our players. Just a great away win and just great work from all of our guys.”

What impressed Frazier most was the way the players handled the early adversity, paving the way for a comeback.

“One of the things that really impressed me when we were on the sideline when we were down 14-0 in the first quarter was that the guys weren’t pointing fingers, arguing or getting mad at each other, that was them.” “We really focused on figuring out what we needed to do to overcome the adversity we faced,” he said. “When you see that as a coach and a teammate, you feel like you’re in the right environment. We never felt like we were out of the game, even if it didn’t look good at the start, and that’s a credit to us. “That’s what you want to see when the boys pull together and come together. I think that’s partly due to the adversity we’ve faced all season long, as part of the process we’re in, starting to learn how to win and how to overcome adversity.