The iconic Gatorade shower is a rite of passage for a Super Bowl champion, but for Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald, the celebratory dousing came with a painful and unexpected price. Just moments after guiding Seattle to a 29-13 victory over New England in Super Bowl LX, the championship tradition left him dealing with an issue he didn’t see coming.

“When the game ended, I’m like… Is there going to be a Gatorade bath?” Macdonald revealed on the Pardon My Take podcast. “Then it was like, coming straight at me. So I was like, well, you just embrace it and just jump into it. I did, like, screw my ear. I got an ear infection a week later.”

He then added, “I sound funky right now. I’m still dealing with it. But I had an ear infection. I was hurting for a minute. That’s crazy. Totally worth it.”

The vibrant yellow shower was the playful handiwork of Seahawks fullback Brady Russell and linebacker Patrick O’Connell, who joyfully soaked their coach just moments after the final whistle.

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This week, the head coach was busy at the NFL Scouting Combine.

“It’s an extra data point that we can help contribute to the whole kind of equation,” he said. “It’s just an opportunity for us to get to know these guys. We’re entering the evaluation timeline.”

Now that the combine has wrapped up, Macdonald plans to take a short vacation in Hawaii.

“Mike Macdonald says he still hasn’t watched the Super Bowl tape. He’s not sure when he will. Says he has a trip to Hawaii planned for next week and definitely ain’t watching it out there,” insider Michael-Shawn Dugar wrote last month.

While a bizarre ear infection from the Super Bowl celebration is a minor nuisance, coach Mike Macdonald is already focused on the larger picture: cementing his team’s place in the history books.

Mike Macdonald sees the 2025 Seahawks among the NFL’s all-time greats

The Seattle Seahawks closed the 2025 season as champions in Super Bowl LX, and many already call them one of the most complete teams of the modern era. As many begin to call the 2025 Seahawks one of the most complete teams of the modern era, head coach Mike Macdonald has thrown his own hat in the ring, boldly staking his squad’s claim among the all-time greats.

“The 2025-26 Seattle Seahawks, I think, deserve to be recognized as one of the all-time great teams, great performances,” Macdonald told Eisen. “Find me a stat and compare it to everybody else. But that’s important, you know, in the history books, and our guys deserve that recognition.”

And Macdonald has a strong case. The Seahawks finished 14-3, the best record in the league. Notably, two of their three losses came against division rivals who reached the postseason, and Seattle answered back by beating those same teams later. And they won two of their three playoff games by at least 16 points, which shows how dominant they were.

Statistically, the Seahawks ranked third in scoring and eighth in total yards. They were also inside the top 10 in both rushing and passing. On defense, they led the NFL in points allowed and ranked sixth in yards given up, while staying in the top 10 against both the run and the pass.

With a dominant season capped by a Lombardi Trophy, Macdonald isn’t just celebrating a title; he’s making a direct challenge for his team’s place in the NFL pantheon.