Seattle Seahawks WR Tyler Lockett 'grateful' entering 10th season

our guy Tyler Lockett sitting down we'll get the headsets on him and have a have a conversation I feel like it's been a minute since we've had a chance to talk to him oh it's been an off season yeah it's been an offseason we were just commenting you guys were doing some drills running up the BM there you didn't look very interested in that I was watching you climb over the fence oh you kind of got on your stomach and swung one leg over then swung the other I didn't want to use too much energy do you think your rookie or you would have just stood there and just hopped right over like a like a bunny rabbit there rookie here I might have walked all the way around well how how the offseason go for you how how you feeling coming in the camp now oh man I feel pretty good I mean you know obviously it was a different off season with all the changes and stuff like that but um I think it was really good man we went into the off season um came up here for OTAs got to meet the coaches kind of like had to adjust you know a little bit when it came to a lot of the stuff that they wanted to be able to bring and then you get about six weeks off to be able to get your mind right get your body right and now you know what to expect because you were able to kind of get a glimpse of it in OTA so I think it's really been great out here man I think everybody's getting along and everybody's pushing each other and I mean that's what you want especially at the start of Camp man I got nine years and I wanted to get 10 so bad you're in your 10th year I mean that's an awesome accomplishment is that is that something that uh was kind of a goal of yours or no I wanted to play eight at least when I first started my goal was to you know kind of get the eight and I wouldn't even say it was a goal it was just like if people said man what's the longest you want to play I'm like probably eight is that right you know but I woke up I think going into the camp the first day and I was like this can't be year 10 and I was like one two three four I said there's no way I've been playing 10 years and so I mean it it's truly a blessing you know I I thank God you know for still putting me in this position uh you know shout out to snides for just being able to make that tough decision you know obviously I'm sure they had to figure out if they wanted to keep me or not so you know really appreciative that they kept me and you know they believe that I still have more in the tank to give and you know that's what I'm here to do is just give it everything I got what what does that do for you in terms of motivation knowing they they're up there going is he is he with us is he not that they're thinking of you in that way where you've been i' I've said in my opinion you're the second best receiver in the history of this organization behind Steve LaRon I mean you've been huge for this organization for so many years but now it happens to everybody when you get older and you hear those conversations how do you how does that motivate you yeah well I mean I appreciate it man for you know your words and stuff like that I think you know I think for me man it's it's a part of the game once you get in your 30s you understand that you know things happen politics get involved decisions have to be made it's more business oriented you know a lot of stuff like that but for me it's all about however long you want to play that's all you can control and that's all you got to be able to focus on you can't focus on what team is going to be for because this is more of a business sometimes we treat it kind of like this is still that extracurricular activity and it's not you know what I mean so I think for me it's like you know in the long run you want to be here you're familiar with here you love being here they love having you here but you still got to be able to produce and so that's something that's understandable if they felt like I didn't produce enough I can't do nothing but just shake the hand and go the next way but they want me to be here I'm still happy to be here and now I'm able to just continue to grow my game continue to get better it doesn't matter if I'm 31 32 years old there's still room for improvement when it comes to me still being able to play this game all right so what did what was on your list to improve on coming into this camp or do you you just kind of come across those as as they come uh well I mean it it was a story that I I heard and it kind of like made me think about things in a different way I'll talk about it maybe one day but it it kind of made me want to do things a lot different obviously when you've been at this place for so long you know how to train you know how to grind but sometimes you got to just be able to try to take it a step further and see how far you can get obviously you still grind smart you know but you can still push yourself in a way to where you take yourself where you've never taken yourself before and so I think you know even coming in Camp I mean obviously as you get older it's not that you get slower but sometimes the younger guys get faster right and so you you learn different ways of being able to make better moves you know to um to sell your route a little bit better to to be able to set them up more at the line or just being able to focus more on Dy phase and so for me it's those little intricate that allow you to be able to create two steps of a separation rather than a half a step and so those are the things that I kind of been focusing on a lot more when when you look at your season last season the numbers aren't what you were doing every year they weren't that far off though so do you look at last season as a disappointment do you feel like man I didn't I didn't do this well that well how did was it did you feel differently physically or what what was how do you view last season I mean last season was like the other Seasons you know but at the same time there's not a lot of receivers that do four or five years straight you know of a th000 yards so I mean sometimes you can put somebody in this High position to where it's like okay we know where he's always at he should be able to get here but at the same time I mean we bring in so many other great players got to figure out how to give everybody the ball sometimes it takes away from routes and stuff that you're used to being able to do because now we don't do that anymore and so there's a lot of things that go into the game of you know how we get to the stats that we get you know it's only one football we can't throw everybody the ball so sometimes the teams will get other people a chance to be able to get the ball more so obviously for me like the stats might have not been where I wanted to be but I think that I did the role that they wanted me to play to the best of my ability and I think that's all that you can do because everybody gets different roles and I mean you see it through other teams some guys their role is to get the ball 20 times a game but you know sometimes they can't do that unless the other people do their role and get everybody else open so you know sometimes like you know the difference here in Seattle is it's not always about us being able to get the ball 247 we go to the games and we don't know what's going to happen or who's going to get the ball I might have thought that I was somebody that's just supposed to get somebody else open because that's what it was the whole week and then I end up with seven or eight targets you know so you just never knew and so I think I did what they asked me to do to the best of my ability and I think that I did a great job in being able to help other guys around me better and allow them to be able to take the next steps and the things that they want to do but did it look bad on my part to the outside world probably so because they only look at Stats they don't look at all the other things that we have to bring inside the building or with other people on the field everything you say is always so philosophical I feel bad asking this question would you wear the uh the protective helmet in a game is not an option the guardian the guardian I'm not wearing it I don't plan on wearing it no no I don't I wouldn't think anybody would no I don't think anybody would unless they forced you and said that it was a fine if you didn't because why because of just the extra weight and is it just feels different and I mean I don't really pay attention to it but I mean I rather them see the logo of the team that we play for you know rather than just seeing helmet like yeah at this point I mean it's cool to wear it in practice you know what I mean but at the same time like man show the Seahawks yeah yeah you know right especially with the Throwbacks who cares about safety right you just got to look good that's that's one thing Tyler you've always been really good at like sort of absorbing hits like that I feel like that's a talent of yours because you know there there's lots of times receivers get blown up right oh yeah and you have a you have a way of kind of softening the blow it seems like a little bit is that just something instinctive or do you work on that or uh I think sometimes it's just a matter of like you got to pick choose which hits to take obviously if it's third down and some change you want to be able to do what you can to get the first down but you know if you're going to get hit by four people and it's second down why run the risk of getting hit by four people obviously to the fans and stuff they get upset because they're like oh he's he's weak he's he's scared but you know I think but I think yeah at the end of the day in our game that we play it's about durability and it's about if you're not being able to keep yourself available it's the next man up and if the next man up does just as good as you now you don't have a job and sometimes they see these they see these guys delivering the blows they see these guys getting hit but they don't see the guys having to go to treatment after that and having to be able to Mis practice and trying to figure out if they're going to be able to play just to get to the next week not like let alone if it's a Thursday night game you know so they just see the Sundays they don't see Monday through Saturday which is where a lot of those hits tailor into okay what do we have planned for this guy going into this week because he can't practice right hey last one before we let you go something that Dave and I have talked a lot about with with all the players that come through here young guys we'll talk to guys as rookies and go man what a great kid enthusiastic really really engaged hopefully they stay that way and then invariably guys change as their Fame grows and their bank account grows and all that you've been the same guy since you got here and I mean that in the best possible way you you've always been humble and very thoughtful with your answers and your Fame has grown and obviously bank account and all that but you remain this guy is that is that just your upbringing is that mentors around you keeping you in check I know Doug used to give you a hard time in a friendly way when he's here but I mean it is pretty remarkable that you've been this guy for a decade well I mean I think the biggest thing is like just where I grew up at like in Oklahoma and Tulsa I mean not a lot of people had much right and so we just learned how to be able to like make the best out of everything that we all had and so it didn't matter if you had a little if you had a lot it was enough because we made it enough and we made it fun so I think just growing up there and being able to learn how to enjoy without having much and enjoy with having a little gave us the chance to be able to realize that even when you get more you still find excitement and enjoyment in the small things so sometimes it's like you can come here and things can get super repetitive but you can be like I can still find the most exciting things and the most fun and these small things you learn how to make $10 stretch you know what I mean you you work your job I worked at Jiffy Lube in high school so it's like you work at Jiffy Lube well to the person that's older about3 to $500 you know working there isn't really nothing but to me in high school it's everything and if I can put 300 in the bank and have 200 in my pocket I'm winning you know and then you go to college and you they say all right we get $750 a month well the way we did it it was 300 for for the rooms and then all of a sudden you paid a little bit of bills so maybe like 400 in total well now you got to survive off of 350 for the rest of the month and that goes with being able to pay for breakfast and pay for lunch so you find ways to be able to make that dollar stretch and you find ways to still enjoy yourselves to the way to when you start making all this money you don't really need to spend it a lot of people they'll learn as you get to this position a lot of people do things for you for free rather than you spend money but sometimes people would just rather spend money than to be able to accept the things for free that comes with maybe being on the Seahawks or being within your agencies and stuff like that it's pretty cool when people want to do stuff for you for free it's got be agree you just got to make sure it doesn't come with other things like yeah I'll take this but what's the catch yeah what do you need me to do okay no catch cool and you're still the best real on the team well I appreciate that I think I'm the only one Mario Bailey shout out to Mario Bailey he's an agent too oh okay yeah oh you you crush Mario oh well you know I think at the end of the day as long as we can get one person it is a win yeah there you go well Tyler we we love talking to you man you're you're a credit to this organization and you have been and glad to see you back this year and of course we wish you nothing but the best and appreciate it yes sir thank you there you go the great Tyler lock at everybody always good to talk to him we're going to come back