FWIW, beyond some Hawks fans and the occasional 9ers fan who is way too stuck in the past, I don't think anyone actually thinks the sky is falling in Seattle, or the Seahawks are on the verge of falling.
It's a nice framing device for La Canfora for sure, but I don't think it's really based in reality (it's why he starts by asserting that there's some type of annual prediction about the Seahawks falling apart, but doesn't actually link to anyone ever making that claim -- maybe it's out there but I read a ton of national NFL news and I've seriously never seen it before).
Instead, I think the national impression of the Hawks is that they're a really good team which is in the Super Bowl hunt year in and year out, but in being really good they're also pretty fascinating as they really seem to ride the razor's edge of chaos.
It's a neat and interesting story because there's a belief that riding that edge is a big part of what makes them so great, but at the same time for national reporters and fans of every other team in the NFL, it seems like there's almost always *something* going on with the Hawks that's kinda nuts.
When people talk about that they're not talking about the Hawks being on the verge of collapse (again, I've literally never seen that argument made in print by a national reporter, but if someone said that once I'm sure I'll be linked to it), but rather, they're kind of speculating that if the Hawks ever DO decline at all it might be a factor in it.
That's not people being haters, it's people being fascinated about a thing that's actually pretty fascinating about a really, really good team like the Seahawks.
I think this is the key paragraph in La Canfora's piece:
Except, well, I'm not buying it. I'm not disputing that there isn't a unique and somewhat bizarre culture in Seattle, and that the protocols certainly wouldn't work everywhere. But it has worked well enough, long enough, for this group that I'm not betting against them yet.
After circling around the point and trying to write it away he basically owns up to agreeing that there IS a "unique and somewhat bizzarre culture in Seattle," but uses that admission to suggest that the unnamed everyone-else who acknowledges it do so to argue for the Hawks' impending demise. It's that second point -- that in talking about how atypically newsy the Hawks seem to always be people are actually predicting their demise -- which I think is a strawman. I simply just don't see that stuff. The CLOSEST I see to it is variations on the statement "things seem to still be kinda crazy up in Seattle, but it hasn't stopped them yet so there's no reason to think it will now."
Basically, I think La Canfora's trying to pitch his position as a contrarian position, but it's actually the standard position from which national reporters talk about the Seahawks.
