For Mills the light at the end of that tunnel was bright. He played at least one defensive snap for the Seahawks from Week 14 all the way through the Super Bowl. In Weeks 16 and 17 he made a few tackles, but it was in the Super Bowl where Mills reached his high of the season. On his first snap of the Super Bowl, he notched his first-career sack. Mills blew right through the guard, taking down both the guard and New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye.
"It's funny because I don't remember the play at all," Mills said. "I kind of just blacked out and went, and just remembered after the play, celebrating. It's cool to look back like 'Man, that worked out perfect.'"
Teammate AJ Barner remembers how excited everyone was for Mills.
"I think he took out the guard and the quarterback on that play, and obviously when any of our teammates make a big play, we're going to get hyped for him," Barner said. "And I think for Rylie to make his first (sack) and that moment was awesome. I think it speaks to the player that he is, and we're going to be able to count on Rylie in big moments. It's the Super Bowl, his first play, and the moment wasn't too big for him. That goes a long way."
That play was sort of a punctuation mark on what had been a long rookie year for Mills.
"A couple days thinking after, I was like, 'Man, that really was like a storybook kind of ending on it.'"
Mills added, "Looking back at it, I feel like my takeaway is it kind of just felt like the end of like a long chapter in mycareer," Mills said of his sack. "I felt like from the start of the injury and the rehab process, you go through so many different phases and the ultimate goal is to get back and get back to who I was before the injury."
After watching from the sidelines most of last season, this offseason has been a pleasant change for him and he's ready to take on the challenge of his second season.
"I feel like now I'm fully back to myself and fully back to who I was before the injury. So, I want to step in that role and be a player that gets better every day. For me, it's just about that improvement, and I know not everything's been perfect, but I want to get better each and every day that I'm out here."
"It's been nice having the offseason just to kind of get back to working out and get my body back… I feel a whole different player than I was when I first came back."