Insider notes on Pete Carroll's Seahawks exit: What iconic HC wanted in 2024 and why Dan Quinn might not replace him just yet

While the football world focuses on the conference title games, there’s a whole world of different news breaking at Shrine Bowl practices in Frisco, Texas. Much of it has to do with the Seattle Seahawks.

On Jan. 10, an emotional Pete Carroll stepped down as head coach of the Seattle Seahawks after a successful 14-year career that included two trips to the Super Bowl and one win in 2014 against the Denver Broncos. Carroll’s teams made the playoffs in all but four of those seasons and were left on the outside looking in this past year.

Soon after stepping down as head coach of the Seahawks and agreeing to remain with the organization as an advisor, Carroll said in a radio interview that it was “not football people” making the final call in his dismissal as head coach of the Seahawks in what was initially reported as a mutual parting of the ways.

But as we know, there are always two sides to the story.

Seattle Seahawks Press Conference

Pete Carroll flip-flopped on Seahawks exit

I’ve been told here in Frisco that down the stretch of the season, Carroll had told Seahawks decision-makers he was going to retire at the end of the year but wanted to stay on with the club in some capacity. The initial decision to step down was Carroll’s choice. The team then put plans in motion to look for a new coach once Carroll publicly announced his decision.

Yet after the final game of the season, when the Seahawks were officially eliminated from the playoffs after a Green Bay Packers’ victory over the Chicago Bears, Carroll had a change of heart and told team officials he wanted to stay on as head coach in Seattle. I’m told by then it was too late, and the Seahawks chose to move ahead with plans to find another head coach.

The process has been an exhaustive one for the organization, as they are just one of two teams left with a vacancy at head coach. And while that search seems to be pointing to Dan Quinn, who was with the Seahawks from 2009 through 2014 in capacities from assistant head coach to defensive coordinator, I’m told the organization intends to interview Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator Mike McDonald for the opening.