Marshawn Lynch's Beautiful One-Man War on Everything

Success in the NFL hinges on how coherently 11 dudes on one side of the ball can smash the 11 dudes on the other side. That means rigorous schematics. It means cohesion. It means there isn't a whole lot of room for individual expression. Good running backs understand the system. They are patient, picking their spots, and running to the path of least resistance as it is presented to them by their offensive line. Marshawn Lynch, however, doesn't really need to do that shit. Sure, sometimes he'll wait his turn and play the odds, as NFL strategy dictates; but other times, he'll just turn straight into the churn and go at opposing players head on. He usually wins. If being a good running back is about dictating the terms of contact near the line of scrimmage, being a great one is about being able to win the battle no matter on whose terms it is being fought.

This is what Lynch does, but it is also not all he does. When he's in full motion, swaggering with momentum, the air feels thick with possibility. He could decide to go full battering ram and take on two opponents at once, or turn on the jets and make a 24-yard run look utterly casual, or he might push straight through an entire defensive line. Would-be tacklers look like bad guy henchmen in an action movie, hapless victims whose only purpose is to get stomped on by the hero. No matter the play, he always grabs an extra yard or two, as if to assert that even if he has to go down, he's going to win every last little skirmish.

The same goes for his battles with the NFL and the media. Lynch, you may have heard, has an antagonistic relationship with would-be authority. After the NFC title game, the league fined him $20,000 for grabbing his dick during a touchdown celebration and told him that if does it in the Super Bowl, it will be a 15 yard penalty. The noxious paternalism of Roger Goodell and Co. telling Lynch not to grab his dick is to be expected, but meanwhile the league is selling posters for $150 on NFL.com that feature the celebration. This is even more grossly hypocritical than usual. Meanwhile, when Lynch wanted to shine against the Packers with some gem-quality gold cleats, Papa Goodell came down hard and threatened ejection.

Lynch's quiet revolt continued yesterday at Super Bowl Media Day. Lynch answered every question with "I'm here so I won't get fined." His refusal to play along, spout the party line, and stay in his mandated lane is enough to make him a sort of folk hero among certain NFL fans who are tired of league-approved cliches. But when he exudes that same bravado on the field, he becomes something even bigger: rebellious and fun and dominant to such an extent that even 325-pound nose tackle Vince Wilfork is on the record as totally in awe of him. The entrenched sports media should take a cue from the Patriots' bulwark.

Unfortunately, that is nowhere near the case, as best exemplified by Marcus Hayes' straight-faced tirade titled "Seahawks' Lynch makes a mockery of Media Day." The rant is, of course, standard issue pro-authority pap tinged with a grimy patina of self-contradiction and convenient conclusions. Whether or not Lynch desires this sort of response from the media is largely irrelevant. By refusing to go along with the bullshit pageant of Super Bowl Media Day, Lynch has exposed how entitled and childish the people asking the questions really are. Those same people will decry Lynch's character at every turn and bray about the injustice they suffer at his hands, but keep right on filling column inches that rely on framing up Lynch as the new danger. The irony is that none of them grasp how easily the tail is wagging the dog. Or maybe it's the dick grabbing the hand?

Either way, this much has become clear: within the broader alchemy of the Seahawks' success, Lynch's inherent unpredictability is an asset, a vital one. Lynch, of course, can't win the Super Bowl on his own, but he will dictate Seattle's success more than maybe anyone. And while he surely cannot beat the media and the NFL on his own, he is setting an example for how modern athletes can turn the sports industry on its head by refusing to be a cog in systems meant to dehumanize and diminish—and he's doing it on the biggest stage in all of American sports. That's how it should be, the stylistic advances of football's best artist celebrated in the biggest game of the season. Maybe he'll even grab his dick.