Richard Sherman suited up with an array of all-time great players over his 11-year NFL career. Pro Bowlers, record breakers, future Hall of Famers–all like Sherman himself. It’s no easy task to narrow down his greatest former teammates, but that’s exactly what he did in a Sept. 18 article he wrote for The Athletic. Except, Sherman’s list isn’t about who played the best on the field. He specifically named the best leaders he played with.
“When I played in the NFL, there wasn’t one thing I looked for in a leader,” Sherman wrote. “I learned that leaders come in all shapes and sizes, from loud and out front to quiet and just going about their business.
“But the one thing I always looked for was consistency. There’s power in consistency. It’s hard to see someone as a leader if you can’t depend on them.”
We’ll go through the four teammates Sherman praised as the best leaders. As many readers quickly pointed out, Russell Wilson, perhaps tellingly, isn’t one of them.
Bobby Wagner
Sherman and Wagner played alongside each other for six years on the Seattle Seahawks. Both players, likely to be enshrined in Canton, were key defensive figures for the Seahawks’ 2013 Super Bowl team.
“The lack of ego with Bobby Wagner is one of the things I admired most about him,” Sherman said. “He was one of the best, if not the best, players on the team in Seattle. But that was never something that he cared about.”
Wagner, now on the Commanders, has made the Pro Bowl 10 times and been named a first-team All-Pro six times across his storied 14-year career. He was selected to the NFL 2010s All-Decade Team.
Marshawn Lynch
Sherman used a single phrase to sum up Marshawn Lynch: one of a kind. “Unique is a cheap word to really describe Marshawn,” Sherman wrote. “One of a kind. One-of-a-kind leader. One-of-a-kind player. One-of-a-kind human.”
Sherman and Lynch, teammates for five seasons in Seattle, were a unique contrast with two of the biggest personalities in the league. Sherman was outspoken. Lynch was famously taciturn, at least with the media.
“If you ever needed Marshawn, you could call him at 1 o’clock in the morning to come pick you up, and he’s going to come get you,” Sherman added. “If you’re in the locker room, going through something, and sitting by yourself, he’s not going to walk out of the locker room without saying something.”
Kam Chancellor
Chancellor, a feared, hard-hitting safety, was one of the most prominent members of the Legion of Boom. He and Sherman played on the Seahawks together for seven seasons. In his write-up, Sherman amusingly compared Chancellor to Harry Potter.
“It’s like the quote Dumbledore tells Harry Potter: ‘It is a curious thing, Harry, but perhaps those who are best suited to power are those who have never sought it…That quote perfectly embodied Kam. very step, every moment, every thought was to help the team. There were countless plays on tape where somebody was out of position, where somebody made a mistake, and Kam cleaned it up.”
Fred Warner
Sherman and Warner were division rivals until the cornerback signed with the San Francisco 49ers in 2018. They only played together for three seasons, but Warner left a major impression on Sherman.
“Fred Warner went from a guy who didn’t speak a lot and transformed himself,” Sherman wrote. “Through work ethic, through dedication and through learning from other people, he became one of the best leaders.
“His teammates respect him because of his play, his preparation, his dedication, his consistency and because of how deliberate he is with all of it.”
Russell Wilson
Despite the success they shared for six seasons in Seattle, Russ and Sherm had a notably detached relationship. In 2017, ESPN’s Seth Wickersham wrote that the two were “neither friends nor enemies…They simply coexist.”
There have been numerous articles and anecdotes over the years in which former Seahawks voiced displeasure with Wilson. Typically, the criticism isn’t about Wilson’s on-field performance but his locker room presence. On a 2023 podcast appearance, linebacker K.J. Wright said, “When it’s all said and done, (Russ) has got a lot of making up to do. He’s got a lot of phone calls to make. A lot of, ‘Hey, bro, I should have done better with that.’”
It’s worth noting that Sherman didn’t list any offensive players in The Athletic article. He naturally spent more time with his fellow defensive players, gaining more opportunities to observe their leadership. Yet, omitting Wilson evokes the long-standing rumors that the Super Bowl-winning quarterback didn’t always connect with his teammates.