Mike Macdonald told a story about Sean Payton‘s threat and Spygate accusation on an episode of “In Depth with Graham Bensinger” that was released on Tuesday. By Wednesday, the Seattle Seahawks coach was telling reporters the remarks were never meant for public use, and that he had already reached out to the Denver Broncos coach.
In the interview, Macdonald said Seattle pulled roughly 100 plays from Broncos training-camp clips that fans had posted on social media before the teams met in the 2024 opener, his first game as a head coach. Seattle won that game 26-20.
“He got wind of it and he lost it,” Macdonald said of Payton. “So, he called John [Schneider]. He basically threatened to come out publicly and do a whole Patriot Spygate type of thing. I’m sitting there like, ‘Oh my god. We didn’t cheat.'”
Seattle answered with a lawsuit threat of its own, by Macdonald’s account, and the standoff held through the season.
“So, we had to counter with him and say, ‘If you come out with this, we’re going to sue you because it’s not true.’ … The season ends, and he let it go. But it was like the Cold War,” Macdonald said. “He’s like, ‘I’m going to hit the button. I’m going to hit the button.’ ‘Well, we’re going to hit the button.’ None of us hit the button.”
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