Just wanted to pass along the full quote from outgoing Seahawks boss Tim Ruskell regarding the team's failed attempts to keep Steve Hutchinson after the 2005 season:

"I talked to my wife the other day and I said, 'Let’s look at that will again. It says burial, but let’s go for cremation so they won’t be able to write, 'Here lies the man that lost Hutch' on my tombstone.' "

That was one of the best self-deprecating quotes I've heard from a sports executive or anyone. Losing Hutchinson to the Vikings became a symbol for everything that went wrong with the Seahawks over the subsequent years. The mistake was significant, but also overblown. Football is such a team sport. The Seahawks won two playoff games after Hutchinson departed. The Vikings, though 10-1 this season and a legitimate Super Bowl contender, still have not won a postseason game since paying out all that money for the best guard in the game.

"Given that situation again, obviously you would want a different result," Ruskell said. "We went in it with the purest of intentions. Everybody knows what we wanted to have happen there. That's what we thought would happen, and it didn't, for an unusual set of circumstances. And I’ll forever be remembered for that, unfortunately, but it wasn’t for lack of wanting the right thing to happen and getting a deal done."