Seahawks coach OK with his punter’s gutsy play. ‘I’d like to think it showed you our mentality, too’

Pete Carroll made a baseball analogy Monday afternoon during his weekly press conference at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center.

No, it had nothing to do with the touchdown celebration the Seahawks receivers started in the end zone in Detroit — when Tyler Lockett beaned Doug Baldwin with the football, Baldwin charged the make-believe mound and Lockett pretended to cold-cock him.

Instead, Carroll’s analogy was about his rookie punter, Michael Dickson, whose gutsy decision to run out of his own end zone on fourth-and-8 and pick up a first down with two minutes to play sealed Sunday’s 28-14 win over the Lions.

“Once he made his decision to go, he went for it,” Carroll said of the play. “He put his head down, and barreled across the sticks. ...

“Players and athletes get a chance sometimes where they’ve got to go, or they don’t, and it showed you his mentality to a certain extent. I’d like to think it showed you our mentality, too. We trust our guys.”

How does that involve baseball? Carroll went on to liken Dickson’s bold move to something his favorite baseball player, former San Francisco center fielder Willie Mays, would do.

“The guy always played with the sense that he was looking to do something special, if you gave him an opportunity, and lots of times he just created them,” Carroll said. “I grew up thinking that’s the way you should play.

“He was my hero. He was everything to me as a kid. That’s the kind of play he would make. He’d see a situation, and he’d do something nobody would ever think you could possibly pull off, and he would.”

Carroll looks for players with similar mentalities in the Seahawks organization — players that have the background, courage and faculties to make bold decisions, and make them right, he says.

“I would like our guys to be able to improvise well and find the ways to make special things happen,” Carroll said.

Of course, he’s not directly comparing Dickson to Mays, but it’s the same general idea.

“As crazy as that connection sounds, I’ve always thought that way,” Carroll continued. “I’ve always felt like that’s the way you should play the game — go for it, and see if you can make stuff happen.”

Carroll said he brought up the subject of fake punts to Dickson a couple of weeks ago.

Dickson said after Sunday’s game that Carroll ran the idea by him when the team was in London, questioning why Dickson hadn’t just taken off at some point.

“He was like, “If there’s a gap, just run it,’ ” Dickson said.

Sunday’s attempt was a complete improvisation on Dickson’s part, Carroll acknowledged, but it turned into a “very positive play.” The call was for Dickson to waste a few seconds before taking a safety.

“The fact that he could put that together and utilize it at a time like that, and and make a play like that, it just shows you the kind of athlete and competitor he is,” Carroll said. “To not give him that chance, he might not have done that.”

The freedom to go for big plays like that doesn’t always exist, Carroll said, but he wants his team to take shots.

“I’m always going to encourage the guys I coach to look for those opportunities, and not be afraid of what they’re going to do wrong, and the mistakes they’re going to make,” he said.

He said that approach is why he’s so comfortable with having a quarterback like Russell Wilson, who has consistently throughout his career turned broken plays into big ones.

Carroll pointed to one snap against Detroit, when Wilson took off in the opposite direction on a naked bootleg and scrambled around, only to shirk a defender, come back and have an opportunity to throw the ball.

“He was about 20 yards behind the line of scrimmage at one point, and looking backwards, and he comes out of that,” Carroll said. “I love to see him do that kind of stuff.”

He knows the big risks don’t always reward, but he wants the players that will take them.

“If you put guys through situations, and you prepare them to do stuff, then you trust that they’re going to get it done,” Carroll said. “It doesn’t always work out, but sometimes great things don’t happen unless you give them the chance.”

Praise for Coleman

In his second stint in Seattle, defensive back Justin Coleman has become a key member of the secondary, with the Seahawks running nickel coverage 86 percent of the time in the past three games.

“He’s been doing a great job,” Carroll said. “He’s been matching up with a lot of really good players, and had a lot of good coverage outings. “He’s had some tackles that have gotten away from him, and some missed opportunities, but he’s working to make sure that’s not going to be a factor.”

Coleman helped the Seahawks escape Detroit with a two-touchdown win when he picked off Matt Stafford at the 1-yard line with 3:11 to play.

“It’s just something we work on all the time in practice,” Coleman said after the game. “I see the quarterback rolling out, and I feel like I had to just get in the space where I felt like he was going to throw it, and he threw it and I was able to come down with the pick.”

Stafford was looking for former Seattle receiver Golden Tate in the end zone, when Coleman leaped in front of Tate and snatched the ball and touched down on his toes, saving what would have likely been a touchdown, and could have trimmed Seattle’s lead to one possession.

“That was a big play for us,” Carroll said. “They’re knocking on the door again and could have put us in a situation for onside kicks and all that kind of stuff, so ti was a big play. It was a particularly great catch, and a better job of staying in bounds.”

Coleman said the Seahawks defense — which is tied for fourth in the NFL with 10 interceptions — and particularly the secondary are playing with confidence.

“It’s all about confidence and the legacy the older guys left, and we’re just going to carry it on and continue to ball out,” Coleman said.

Extra points

Carroll said the players of concern returning from injury — Ed Dickson, Dion Jordan and K.J. Wright — looked good against Detroit. ... Carroll said Rasheem Green (ankle) should be back this week. “He was all but ready to go,” Carroll said. “We just wanted to wait one more game. ... He’ll be back battling again to play this week.” ... J.D. McKissic (foot) is not eligible to return this week. He was placed on injured reserve on Sept. 3, and has to miss eight games by rule. ... Carroll briefly addressed Brandon Marshall’s lack of snaps — he had two against the Lions. “We threw the ball 17 times and there’s not a lot of chances,” Carroll said.