Good morning, everybody. Welcome to another episode of HockBlogger Mornings. I am Brian

Nemhouser. You can find me. All the stuff that we do at HockBlogger on TikTok, Instagram,

YouTube, Apple, podcast, Spotify, all those places.

And it's a Blue Friday before one of the biggest games in franchise history for the Seahawks

as they battle the 49ers for the number one seed in the NFC.

And if it's a Friday, it means we've got a good pal.

Mike Sando from the athletic on how are you doing on this

2026 new year?

Great, Brian.

Thanks for having me on.

And I'm so looking forward to the games this weekend, the Seattle game in its own slot

there, you know, Saturday night.

That's just going to be a, going to be a fun one. I think Hawk fans are a little bit nervous around here, you know. Yeah. We're going to just had a little mojo in their game, you know, and, uh, yeah, look, they're playing the Bears. There's no defense played in that game. But, but still, you see them having fun and it feels like they're hitting stride, and they're playing with house money, man. Anything they've done, we're talking Mike, Kyle Shanahan, coach of the year. If they lose this game, who cares? I mean, they're already a success story, right? And it feels like for the Seahawks, look, they're in the playoffs either way. But if you got the number one seed right there and you can't beat the 49.

You get swept by the 49ers. Like, hey, aren't Siak fans here? Like, we got Mike McDonald and it's a new game in this division. And it still could be if they lose this game, but it's not so emphatic if they lose this game. Does that make sense? It does. It does. I mean, there's,

that's one of the things I think folks like you and I love about covering sports is the

endless potential multiverse of narratives that can come out of it from the individual player

to the coaches, to the cities, to the franchises. And, you know, there's going to be bards out there spinning their tails one way or another. And we don't get to know what those stories really are going to be until the game gets played. You've been starting it up before the game with your own pregame narratives on these 49er fans. I've noticed that, you know, you do a great job of blending the analysis with being a fan, but it's been a little fan heavy here late in the week.

What's your, what's your feel?

Are you having fun?

I actually am glad you brought that up.

So folks that don't know, like Mike is somebody who not only I consider a friend, but has been like a mentor a bit during this process.

And I've always looked at him for kind of the standard on how,

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