Good morning, everybody.

Welcome to another episode of HockBlogger Mornings.

I am Brian Mouser.

You can find me and all the stuff we're doing on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, at

HockBlogger.

Also on Apple Podcast, Spotify, wherever you get podcasts,

and patreon.com slash HawkBlogger will get you ad-free audio.

And folks, man, I don't know about the rest of you.

I am still just in the glow of the Seahawks beating the Rams from that NFC championship.

And there's really only one guy I wanted to talk to today

because first of all, it's been way, way, way too long.

Second of all, this guy is one of the first faces that comes to mind

when I think about Seahawks and Super Bowl.

Because we spent a pretty special week hanging around New York City the last time this team won one. It's Dave Softie Mahler, KJR. How are you doing, my friend? I'm good. So, yeah, I was the one guy you wanted to talk to after the first guy you wanted to blew you off. Second guy blew you off. Third guy said, I can't do it. Then you called me, right? Let's make sure we're all on the same

page here with this, man. No, it's way farther down the list. No, that's what I thought. Well, I've been asking to come on this thing forever and you've just kept denying me. So I don't know what the hell's taking so damn long to have you to have me back on this thing, man. But yeah, it's good to see you, dude, this is an exciting time for everybody.

Pretty much unexpected, I think, for most of us that this on this thing, man. But yeah, it's good to see you, dude. This is an exciting time for everybody,

pretty much unexpected, I think, for most of us that this team is in this game, but that's

kind of what makes it fun, right? Is that when you get a gift like this, you got to embrace it

because you never know what it's going to happen again, right? Well, since you and I haven't

talked most of this season about this team, I am curious, like, what's this experience been like? Where were you on this team? And, like, what's the journey been? Yeah. I mean, look, I was, just going back to the offseason, I was kind of ready to move on from Gino. I mean, I think that G think that Gino just kind of going, just backtracking for a second,

if you don't mind that I think he did everything the team asked him to do, right? I mean, people forget the situation he was put in, taking over for Russell Wilson, obviously, had to earn that second contract, obviously, from the Hawks and earn that contract from the Raiders. and I think for what Gino was asked to do at that point in time, I think he was fine, right?

But there was obviously a ceiling there that needed to be broken through and the decision to

...