Considering where Tim Ruskell’s career started, behind the counter of a small record shop in Florida, his destination this week couldn’t be more fitting.
The former record store employee is headed to Motown, thanks in large part to his ability to bring together the right mix of music and produce a hit song.
The Seattle Seahawks’ team president has proven to be quite a maestro this year, taking a franchise that has spent years muddled in mediocrity and finally getting it to the big game.
“All the indications early were that we could do this,” Ruskell said after the Seahawks’ wrapped up a memorable 13-3 regular season. “It was more of a tweaking, and let’s-work-on-the-defense and let’s-get-the-attitude-right.”
Whatever his strategy, Ruskell has been able to hit all the right notes.
No one could have guessed 30 years ago that the kid from the record store would help build a Super Bowl team, but he’s now done it twice – also helping shape the Tampa Bay Buccaneers team that won Super Bowl XXXVII.
Ruskell’s eye for talent developed early in life, when he was a young kid watching Dallas Cowboys games while his military father was stationed in Fort Hood, Texas. He actually looked forward to the preseason games, especially after halftime because he liked to try to figure out which young players were good enough to make the team.
“I couldn’t wait for the vets to be done so I could see the rookies,” he said recently. “Most people don’t look at the game that way. So I was odd, at that point.
“… When I watched a game as a kid, I was trying to figure out who could play and who could contribute. It just felt like my niche.”
Ruskell eventually played the game, albeit briefly while attending high school in Florida. Only after he started going to Baltimore Colts training camp sessions to watch Johnny Unitas did it occur to Ruskell that he might want to make a career out of football scouting.
But not until the NFL expanded to Tampa Bay in 1976 did Ruskell’s dream become a reality.
It started when a man named John Herrera, who was one of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ original scouts and would be the key factor in Ruskell’s future career.
Herrera wandered into a record store where Ruskell was working during his freshman year at Central Florida University, and the pair soon got to talking about football. Impressed with Ruskell’s knowledge, Herrera arranged for him to start working as a ball boy with the Buccaneers.
The first day didn’t go well – Tampa Bay head coach John McKay actually fired Ruskell for dropping a football that rolled onto the practice field before later hiring him back – but Ruskell eventually stuck around and formed another key relationship, with fellow ball boy and coach’s son Rich McKay.
Ruskell eventually followed Herrera to the Canadian Football League, where his scouting helped build a Saskatchewan Roughriders team that would eventually win a Grey Cup, before going back to Florida to serve as director of scouting for the Tampa Bay Bandits of the USFL in 1985 and ‘86.
Beginning in 1987, Ruskell would reunite with the younger McKay for a professional relationship that would span almost 20 years, with the Buccaneers’ Super Bowl victory and the Atlanta Falcons’ trip to the NFC Championship Game serving as professional crescendos.
Impressed by his background of finding talent, the Seahawks hired Ruskell as their team president in February. And his scouting eye would pay immediate dividends.
Coming to a team that already had four Pro Bowlers on offense – running back Shaun Alexander, quarterback Matt Hasselbeck and offensive linemen Steve Hutchinson and Walter Jones – Ruskell set about finding the right elements to get the team over the proverbial hump.
He started by getting rid of some players with character issues, like linebacker Anthony Simmons and tackle Chris Terry. He filled in some of the gaps with mid-level free agents like defensive tackle Chartric Darby, wide receiver Joe Jurevicius and defensive end Bryce Fisher – players who might not have had glowing statistics but brought the right type of attitude.
And, 15 wins later, Ruskell had helped build another Super Bowl team.
“You hear every NFL team talk about finding the (player) with character and all that. Honestly, it doesn’t happen all the time,” said linebacker Isaiah Kacyvenski, one of the few Seahawks who have been with the organization more than four years. “You can talk about it, and then the police blotter comes out, and four or five players are in trouble.
“For (Seattle’s success) to happen after everybody talking about it, that’s impressive. It’s got to make the fans feel good; it’s got to make everybody feel good.”
Ruskell said the biggest key was having a good nucleus with which to work.
“I was encouraged by the fact that we had some players, especially on the offensive side of the ball,” Ruskell said of the team he inherited. “We had (head coach) Mike Holmgren, they’d won the division. So I came in feeling optimistic about the team. I said, OK, what could we do to make it better?”
Finding the right pieces is not as easy as it sounds – just ask Bill Bavasi, Mariners fans – and yet Ruskell found a way to complete the puzzle in a matter of months.
“It’s really satisfying, just when you sit back and think of how far we’ve come,” said Kacyvenski, who was part of a 6-10 team during his rookie year in 2000. “The group we have on the team right now, it’s like a big family. Everyone’s always positive. That’s the way it should be.”
A lot of the credit goes to Ruskell, who’s orchestrated something Seahawks fans have never seen before.
But, like any good producer, he’s more comfortable staying off the stage. He rather let the Shaun Alexanders and Matt Hasselbecks and Mike Holmgrens be in the spotlight.
“No one person ever does that, certainly not somebody from the front office,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed working with everybody. It’s just been fun. We work hard, but we enjoy what we’re doing.”
Thousands of Seahawks fans have felt the same way this season.
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