“The Seahawks at the time had a President of the team [Bob Whitsitt] who had come from the NBA and didn’t really know a lot about football but knew a lot about professional sports and he called me saying that Jerry [Rice] wanted to wear number 80 but wanted to ask my permission,” Laregent said. “And so I mean Jerry Rice is asking to wear my number, I’m not going to say no and so I said, ‘Sure, that’s fine with me.’ What [Whitsitt] did was he called Jerry Rice and said, ‘Hey, Steve Largent wants you to wear his jersey when you get to Seattle.’ So Jerry said, ‘Well that’s fine, I’ll wear number 80, I thought it was retired but if Steve wants me to wear it, I’ll wear it.’
“So [Whitsitt] did a little double whammy on both Jerry and myself to ensure that Jerry Rice gets number 80 and [Whitsitt] can sell a bunch of number 80 jerseys or something but it was kind of a scam on both myself and Jerry Rice.”
I remember getting into it with many of you guys about this incident, myself I was calling it one of the blackest days in Seahawks history, while ALL of you guys were saying that, "it wasn't a big deal, because Largent said he could."
Truth is, Largent was put into a situation of looking bad if he didn't (HE NEVER EVER SHOULD HAVE BEEN ASKED TO BEGIN WITH!!! Not one other NFL team EVER has done something that self loathing) and Rice was lied to.
Anyone still want to tell me that it wasn't a big deal? Anyone want to tell me that un-retiring 71 to let someone wear it, because Jones said he could, would be no big deal?
It was a big deal! It was evidence of a team with an incredibly low self esteem, one which had been making decades of stupid decisions, and had never learned from them. It was evidence of a team that had spent decades wallowing in dysfunction, and which had never learned how to be a winner, or a first class organization.
Fortunately, that is no longer the case with our beloved Seahawks, they ARE the world champs, and HAVE figured out how to be winners, and have a first class organization...but it took a new coaching staff, one with a lot of power to do things THEIR way, and an incredible amount of turnover from the previous regimes roster, to finally exorcise the spirit of failure which had become so attached to the Seahawks, and which the whole Rice wearing a RETIRED #80 jersey was so indicative of.
