SAN FRANCISCO – Shaun Alexander was so excited to get back on the field that he didn’t want to come out.
Alexander said after Sunday’s loss to the San Francisco 49ers that he was dictating the playing time that led to him being on the field for more than half of the Seahawks’ 54 offensive plays.
“I controlled all that,” he said. “When they said, ‘Come out,’ then I’d go back in.
“The game is the game, and no one wants to let their team just go like that. Anytime you feel like you have an opportunity to make plays, you don’t say, ‘OK, I’m just going to come out now.’ You just don’t do that.”
While Alexander saw plenty of playing time in his first game since late September, he took a while to find his groove. He finished the game with 37 yards on 17 carries after gaining just 9 yards on seven attempts in the first half.
“My foot did great,” said Alexander, who cracked a bone in his left foot during a Sept. 24 win over the New York Giants. “It was all about the speed of the game.
“That’s kind of why I wanted to play in this game and get back there as soon as possible, because the pressure on myself is so high that I expect to have 100 yards and four touchdowns every week. The sooner I get out there, the more realistic those expectations are.”
The way Seattle’s run game has fared for most of this season, the expectations are not very high. Alexander has been held under 55 yards in three of his four starts, and he’s averaging 2.7 yards per carry. His 224 yards on 87 carries this year give him just 12 more yards than San Francisco running back Frank Gore gained in Sunday’s game.
Alexander had a pretty good excuse for Sunday’s performance in that he has been out of action for so long.
“I thought he did OK,” coach Mike Holmgren said. “He was a little tentative at the beginning. Then in the second half he did some good things. You can tell that he will continue to get better.”
One of Alexander’s best runs, a 15-yarder, got called back because of a holding penalty. His longest run went for 16 yards, but besides that he had just 21 total yards on 16 carries.
“I feel it’s very positive,” Alexander said of his return. “It took me about the first half to make runs and cuts, but in the third quarter I felt very good. Too bad we were down by 20 points.”
Despite Alexander’s rust, Holmgren opted to give him the ball on a key fourth-and-1 late in the game.
The Seahawks were trailing by six points with two minutes left and needed a first down to keep a drive alive. Even though Alexander had already been stopped at or behind the line of scrimmage on five of his 16 carries up to that point, Holmgren had enough faith in him to call a running play to the left side.
San Francisco defensive tackle Bryant Young broke through to stop Alexander behind the line of scrimmage to end that drive.
Holmgren said after the game that “I thought I had a pretty good play called,” but also took responsibility for the failure to get a first down.
“I made the call,” he said. “It didn’t work, so it was a crummy call. If it did work, it would have been a good call.”
In the end, Alexander had another forgettable day. But he was happy to get the first game of his return behind him.
“I’m a pro football player; I play football,” he said. “So it’s just great to be back.”
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