'We weren’t anything and then we were something. We made something special.'

Seattle has never had more fun than it did cheering the Seahawks during Pete Carroll's 14 years as head coach.

Over the past 14 years, I have spent the majority of my professional life talking about Pete Carroll, talking to Pete Carroll or transcribing the statements of Pete Carroll.

I know that he was so small as a ninth grader he needed a doctor’s to note to play tackle football. I know the note came from a Dr. Nutting. I know that his first full-time coaching job paid him $172 a month in Fayetteville, Ark., and that he is a man who is perpetually unable to complete a sentence before he jumps to another thought.

While I understood it was possible that Carroll wouldn’t be back as Seahawks head coach, I was genuinely surprised to learn that he was out as coach and then I became genuinely wistful listening to him talk on Tuesday afternoon. I’m legitimately sad that the guy who oversaw some of the most remarkable things I’ve seen in sports won’t be on Seattle’s sidelines next season. It also got me thinking back to something that happened back in his first year as Seahawks coach, a story I used to tell as evidence of how hard it was to take Carroll at face value but now looks more like a forecast for anyone who was actually, honestly willing to believe: