Friday, May 3, 2013 @ 1:23pm

What's at stake for Smoak, Mariners on road trip

First baseman Justin Smoak's hot streak has coincided with the Mariners winning five of seven games on their recently completed homestand.

Smoak is 11-for-31 (.354) with a home run and three doubles over his last nine games, raising his average 52 points during that stretch. The Mariners, meanwhile, hadn't won a series before taking three of four from the Angels and then two of three from Baltimore.

Now comes the challenge of doing it on the road, where the Mariners will play 14 of their next 17 games.

Brock Huard and Danny O'Neil pick up the conversation from there.

You can listen to Friday's show here.

Thursday, May 2, 2013 @ 5:00pm

Hawk Talk: Live Seahawks chat Friday at 12:30

The Seahawks began the second phase of their offseason program Monday, two days after wrapping up a draft that included some more surprising selections. Rookie minicamp begins next Friday as well.

Sounds like a good time for another edition of "Hawk Talk", wouldn't you say?

Bring your questions and join Danny O'Neil for a live Seahawks chat Friday at 12:30.

Thursday, May 2, 2013 @ 1:14pm

Biggest Seahawks storylines as offseason shifts

Brock Huard and Danny O'Neil discuss what they think are the biggest Seahawks storylines now that the attention has shifted from free agency and the draft to the offseason program.

You can listen to Thursday's show here.

Thursday, May 2, 2013 @ 1:53am

Fore! 'Brock and Danny' hit the links

A matinee Mariners game last Wednesday meant a one-hour show for "Brock and Danny" and a chance to spend the rest of the day on the golf course.

Brock Huard, Danny O'Neil, Tom Wassell and I headed east to Suncadia Golf Resort in Cle Elum for a round at the Rope Rider course. The sun was out, the grass was green and the golfing was comically bad.

We were even treated to a mountain goat sighting, driving up on one as he was scaling a hill along the fairway of the seventh hole.

Enjoy the video.

Wednesday, May 1, 2013 @ 12:18pm

On Marshawn Lynch's absence, pending DUI case

When the Seahawks began their offseason program two weeks ago, the word from safety Earl Thomas was that "only a couple" players weren't in attendance.

Running back Marshawn Lynch was one of them, according to Danny O'Neil.

In the video below, O'Neil and Brock Huard discuss Lynch's absence from the start of voluntary workouts as well as the status of his pending DUI case in Alameda County, Calif.

You can listen to Wednesday's show here.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013 @ 11:20pm

Kings' ransom: Sacramento pays, its team should stay

It's not about you, Seattle.

Everyone needs to be reminded of this after Monday's gut-punch of an announcement that the NBA will not be returning to the city this year. Not after the NBA's relocation committee voted unanimously against allowing the Kings franchise to move to Seattle.

And you know what? The relocation committee is right. That franchise shouldn't move to Seattle.

The Kings are staying in Sacramento after the NBA's relocation committee voted against the team moving to Seattle. (AP)

This was never a heads-up comparison between two cities to determine which was the better spot for a team specifically and the league in general. This was about whether Sacramento would offer the necessary ante to keep the team, and Hansen's purchase was the edge of the knife being held to that city's throat to see if it would fund a new arena and find a new owner who wanted to keep the team in town.

The city of Sacramento met the ransom so the city of Sacramento gets to keep the team. That's how franchise politics works in the NBA, and anyone who thinks it should be different in this case is operating out of the misguided notion that Seattle is owed some sort of special poaching license because it lost the Sonics in 2008.

Seattle doesn't deserve another city's franchise just because of the way its former franchise was wrangled into Oklahoma, and Seattle doesn't deserve another city's franchise because its prospective ownership group has more money or because of the size of its TV market.

It's not about you, Seattle.

The league's relocation committee didn't screw Seattle by recommending against the move; it declined to screw Sacramento, and there is an important difference.

Seattle and its fans have every right to feel used in this process. They were the leverage used to spur Sacramento's urgency to put a deal together. It's OK for Seattle to be resentful, even, that commissioner David Stern was an advocate for Sacramento in a way that he never was for Seattle after Clay Bennett purchased the team from Howard Schultz.

But Seattle was not wronged in this situation. It wasn't victimized, and as admirable and steadfast as Chris Hansen has been in navigating both the political and economic obstacles – first in developing an arena plan and then negotiating a deal to buy the Kings from the Maloofs – it will be very interesting to see what he does next.

On Monday night, he published a statement on SonicsArena.com in which he stated that not only did the group still have an agreement to purchase the franchise from the Maloofs, but that the group intended to see that transaction through. In fact, he used the word transaction three times to emphasize that he saw this as a business deal that was still in place.

Good for him. He shouldn't give up the only leverage that Seattle has left in the situation, the only card he can play to get the NBA to provide a path to a franchise that will come to Seattle. But there's also the distinct possibility given the fight to buy the team and move it to Seattle isn't over. In fact, Hansen said as much in his statement:

"We plan to unequivocally state our case for both relocation and our plan to move forward with the transaction to the league and owners at the upcoming Board of Governor's Meeting in Mid-May."

–Chris Hansen, April 29, SonicsArena.com

Over the past three years, Hansen has shown just how capable and effective he would be as the owner of an NBA team in Seattle. The past two months, however, have shown pretty clearly that it shouldn't be the Kings franchise that he gets to own in Seattle.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013 @ 3:28pm

Seahawks' Hill, Williams can make impacts as rookies

The Seahawks used two of their first four picks on defensive tackles, addressing a position they considered their top priority heading into the draft.

Jordan Hill

"Those guys are totally different style football players," coach Pete Carroll told "Afternoons with the Go 2 Guy" on Monday. "We think we can get a real good combination of style and strength and quickness out of those guys and get a great rotation there if they can work there way up the depth chart."

Brock Huard and Danny O'Neil think Hill and Williams have the best chances of the Seahawks' 11 rookies to make a significant impact in 2013. They explain why in the video below.

You can listen to Tuesday's show here.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013 @ 1:55pm

Williams happy to be a Seahawk after draft-day slide

It happens every draft. A highly rated prospect waits longer than anticipated before hearing his name called, sliding down the draft board for any number of reasons.

Jesse Williams was that player this year. Some projections had the massive defensive tackle from Alabama being selected late in the first round, but it wasn't until Day 3 when the Seahawks traded up in the fifth round to take him with the 137th overall pick.

Concerns about the health of Williams' knee is the most logical explanation for why a player considered to be one of the top prospects wasn't taken until the draft's third day, a slide that cost him a significant amount of money.

The Seahawks traded up to take Jesse Williams after the defensive tackle from Alabama fell to the fifth round. (AP)

"I wasn't really disappointed where I fell," he told "Brock and Danny" on Monday. "I'd rather wait and go to a good team than end up in a place where I couldn't really help out as much. It worked out for me in the end and hopefully it worked out for Seattle as well."

Williams played all along the defensive line during his two seasons at Alabama, but he was drafted by Seattle to fill a specific role. The Seahawks see him as a big-bodied run stuffer who can play the 3-technique tackle spot on early downs, a role filled the past two seasons by Alan Branch. Seattle expects Williams to compete with free-agent addition Tony McDaniel at that spot.

"This is a really cool football player," coach Pete Carroll told "Afternoons with the Go 2 Guy" Monday. "He's very, very strong, he's naturally stout and he's got a great toughness about him."

Williams seems to have it all.

Production? Check. He was a junior-college transfer who started on the Alabama teams that won consecutive national championships. He was a second-team All-SEC selection after a senior season in which he made 37 tackles while manning the middle of the nation's best defense.

Size and athleticism? Check and check. Williams was clocked at his pro day workout at 4.90 seconds in the 40-yard dash, an impressive time for a guy listed at 6-feet-3 and 325 pounds.

Oh, and he's strong. Williams can bench-press 600 pounds, which is considered a lot of weight even in a sport full of massive men with jaw-dropping strength.

It was fairly obvious, then, why he fell so far down in the draft.

"It came down to people worrying about my knee," he said.

Williams had arthroscopic surgery on his right knee after the season to clean up what he described as a "nagging injury that kind of progressed as the season went on." The timing of the operation prevented him from doing everything but bench-press at the scouting combine in late-February. He did it all at Alabama's pro day earlier this month, including that head-turning 40.

"I though that would be enough to sort of clear the air about my knee," he said. "Obviously, it didn't."

Carroll said the Seahawks were concerned about the injury but came to the conclusion that Williams "was going to be plenty good enough with the time to recover." So when the Lions were on the clock with pick No. 137, Seattle gave up a fifth- and sixth-round pick to move up 28 spots and take Williams.

"To get him all the way in the fifth round when we had him up a little higher than that, we were really thrilled about nailing him," Carroll said. "So he's going to get a great chance to play a lot."