"I'd like to thank (owner) Paul Allen, the entire Seahawks organization and the fans outside the state that have supported me throughout my time in Seattle. It has meant so much to me." -- Brian Blades

Sports: Sunday, June 06, 1999

After 11 Exemplary Seasons, Blades Finally Ran Out Of Time With Seahawks
Steve Kelley
Times Staff Columnist

You knew the day was coming.

You'd seen it arrive for so many of your teammates and friends. It is one of those inevitable time passages that you rage against with every tightly strung sinew in your body.

You knew you couldn't juke every cornerback the way you used to. And the pain from every helmet and shoulder pad and elbow and every crash landing on the unforgiving artificial turf lingered from Sunday to Sunday. The ache in your knees and back and shoulders had become as familiar to you as a cough.

But you loved this game. You reacted to the action as if it were a stimulant.

How many times have you risked a rib crossing over the middle, leaping into the air, taking a hit from an ill-intentioned safety and holding onto the ball?

You loved the challenge of sticking your helmet into a secondary's snarling vortex.

You weren't the fastest, or the biggest or the strongest wide receiver, but only Steve Largent caught more passes for the Seahawks than you did.

You had 81 catches in 1994, the most any Seahawk has caught in a season. You had 581 career receptions, 7,620 yards and 34 touchdown catches.

You transcended a generation - from Largent to Joey Galloway. You survived the Behring Years and helped in the Seahawks' recovery. You befriended the lowly free agents who nervously came into their first training camp unsure of the challenges ahead of them.

I don't know one player in your locker room who didn't respect you. I never heard a discouraging word.

You played 156 NFL games. You wanted to play even more.

No coach has found a compassionate way to break the news. No good way to tell an 11-year veteran, a Pro Bowl wide receiver, he was being cut.

Seahawk coach Mike Holmgren said all of the right things.

He said, "Brian Blades is a warrior." Told you, "You'll always be a part of the family."

Some day those words will mean something. Not today.

Some people are doctors. Some are stockbrokers. You're a football player and you've been willing to do whatever you've been asked to stay in the game.

You played for the league minimum salary last season. You volunteered for special teams this spring. More Sundays. That's all you wanted.

In these last seasons, the game has become your refuge. The vivid memory of that incomprehensible night in 1995 - when you wrestled with your cousin and a gun was fired and your cousin was killed - is with you every day of your life.

That one night, your life was torn apart like a snapshot. You've spent the past four years trying to reassemble the picture.

Sundays helped dull the pain and piece together that shredded photo.

In the years after that tragedy, your teammates have been your family.

Eugene Robinson. Chris Warren. Dave Brown.

They gave you unconditional love when your world was full of hate.

We hope you will be remembered for the catches as well as the tragedy.

You should be remembered as an athlete who never cheated his team, who always came to camp in shape, who always worked harder, who never quit on a ball over the middle.

And I'll remember a Tuesday in December 1993 at a school for homeless children in Seattle. You brought teammates to the school to distribute Christmas gifts. It had become an annual visit.

"The Seahawks are weak, man," an angry child told you, turning away from your presents.

You could have quit on the boy. You wouldn't have been the first adult to disappoint him. But you stayed with him and told him stories about the NFL and 10 minutes later, the boy was laughing.

There were no TV cameras around. No sold-out cheering crowd. It was just you and a boy who'd never gotten a break in his life. And you were willing to share your good fortune with him.

I'll remember your catches and your courage.

I'll remember your tragedy.

But I'll also remember the affection you showed to a fourth-grade boy who only wanted your friendship.

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