Intensity is a quality that every manager and coach covets in their players, but it's an athletic virtue that comes with a footnote: Too much of it, misdirected or ill-timed, can sometimes be a detriment.
In other words, it's a fine line to hone one's competitive fire and not have it burn (or at least singe) on occasion. That's a reality that the Mariners, heading down the stretch in the thick of a tight playoff race, and the Seahawks, embarking on a promising season that got off to a miserable start Sunday, are dealing with head-on.
When youth is added to the equation, the volatility factor rises exponentially. And when the overflowing competitive juices are attached to a player with overflowing talent, well, the tolerance level of all involved rises commensurately.
Last week, Mariners pitcher George Kirby got a rise out of every former player who thinks the current crop of major-leaguers is soft — a generational sentiment that has prevailed for time immemorial. Kirby, a highly emotional player who is known to take poor performances particularly hard and to heart, vented after giving up a two-run, game-tying home run during the seventh inning in Tampa Bay, a game the Mariners lost. Kirby's ire was at least partially directed at Mariners manager Scott Servais, who sent Kirby out to pitch the seventh with 93 pitches thrown.
"I wish I wasn't out there for the seventh, to be honest," Kirby told reporters after the game. "I was at [more than] 90 pitches. I didn't think I needed to go any more. But it is what it is."
A few days later, Mariners outfielder Jarred Kelenic was activated after two months on the injured list, the result of a temper tantrum after a costly strikeout against the Twins. Kelenic, another player who is notorious for being tightly wound, kicked a Gatorade cooler and fractured his foot, costing the Mariners a productive starter for 50 games.
Then there's Seahawks wide receiver DK Metcalf, who received one in an ongoing series of unsportsmanlike conduct penalties throughout his career late in the Rams' 30-13 bludgeoning of Seattle. Metcalf, who has shown himself vulnerable to being goaded into penalties, said he was reacting to the Rams' response to his hit on Ahkello Witherspoon.
"I saw their coaches yelling at me or saying something to me and their players," Metcalf said after the game. "I let that get to me, and I retaliated. You know the second man always gets called, so just have to be better in that aspect."
Obviously, these are all different circumstances, and different levels of transgressions. But they are united by a couple of things. All three players in question are known to wear their emotions on their sleeves, and play with an intensity that is generally lauded as a huge positive. And all are at the outset of their careers, still learning how to control their emotions. Kelenic turned 24 a week after his cooler-kicking incident. Kirby and Metcalf are both 25, separated in age by less than two months.
To Servais, this was a teachable moment for both players, and Kelenic and Kirby seemed to treat it as such. Kelenic referred to his time on the IL as "a timeout" that forced him to ponder the consequences of his action and added, "For me, personally, arguably, it could be one of the best things that's ever happened to me on a baseball field."
Kirby, meanwhile, met with the media the next day to offer a mea culpa of sorts, after apologizing in person to Servais.
"Obviously, I screwed up," Kirby said. "That's not me. Skip's always got to pry that ball out of my hands. Just super uncharacteristic of me as a player and who I am out there on that mound. I love competing.
"I wear my emotions on my sleeve more than anyone else," Kirby said Saturday. "It's a blessing and a curse at the same time."
That sentiment certainly seems to apply to Metcalf, whose fierce intensity has teamed with his exquisite athletic gifts to make him one of the most productive and feared receivers in the NFL. But Metcalf's occasional lapses of hotheadedness have been a concern throughout his career.
In 2021, Metcalf received three flags for personal fouls and was disqualified from a game in Green Bay after an altercation in which he grabbed the face mask of Packers safety Henry Black. He was also fined that year for a tussle with New Orleans' Marshon Lattimore on a play in which he was not penalized. Last year, Metcalf was fined $10,609 for an unsportsmanlike penalty call when he head-butted Rams cornerback Jalen Ramsey, and $29,785 for getting into an argument with a ref in Seattle's game with Tampa Bay in Munich, Germany.
After the New Orleans' incident, Metcalf said, "I have to grow up."
He and coach Pete Carroll have had numerous heart-to-heart talks about his volatility, including one in the aftermath of Sunday's incident, which had no effect on the outcome of the game.
"I'm a passionate player, and I'm never going to back down from anything," Metcalf said in 2021. "He understands that. But at the same time, I'm starting to become a leader on this team. I have to grow up and continue to get better. I know that I'm still a work in progress. I don't like to use my age as an excuse, but sometimes I forget that I'm 23 years old. I have to continue to grow each day and the mistakes are going to get fixed."
Obviously, it's still a work in progress for Metcalf. Of his talks with Carroll this week, he said, "That's between me and Pete, but the gist of the message was that I'm a target now, and I've got to carry myself as such and not continue to hurt the team. That's what I'm going to do."
Metcalf, who last year caught 90 passes for 1,048 yards, is obviously worth the patience. Kirby is one of the best young pitchers in the game, and Kelenic is a former elite prospect who was in the midst of a breakout season when he got hurt. In all cases, their fire is an important part of their skill set.
"Oh, they're super competitive," Servais said of Kirby and Kelenic. "I think that's an understatement. And that's what's allowed them to be very successful at a young age in the big leagues, and that's what's going to carry them forward."
The challenge moving forward for all three will be reining in that intensity when it threatens to get the better of them.
