Mike Macdonald revealed that he and the Seattle Seahawks faced SpyGate-like accusations from another head coach following a matchup between their respective teams during the 2024 season
Head coach Mike Macdonald of the Seattle Seahawks looks on during the third quarter of the game against the Arizona Cardinals at State Farm Stadium on September 20, 2026 in Glendale, Arizona
Seattle Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald was accused of unscrupulous tactics in 2024(Image: Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images)
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Mike Macdonald and the Seattle Seahawks were accused of playing by the same rulebook as the infamous Connor Stallions.
Stallions was formerly a coach at Michigan and gained notoriety for a sign-stealing scandal during the 2023 college football season, which led to his dismissal. In the wake of that controversy, the Seahawks' head coach revealed that Sean Payton accused Seattle of doing the same thing, despite the franchise adhering to all the rules.
Speaking with Graham Bensinger, Macdonald explained how Payton confronted him and the franchise about supposedly stealing plays, roughly two years before the Seahawks won the Super Bowl.
"So a funny story about Sean Payton and me is my first year," he began to Bensinger. "He's not my biggest fan. So our first year and so we play them our first game and so like you know I'm like 'Well whatever it's a fans watch - fans will like tape or like post plays from training camp on Twitter.' And so it's like public.
"So we took like a hundred plays from their training camp. We're like scouting them. And anyways he got wind of it and he like lost him. It's like middle of the season and like and we're and we won the game so like and we're and we were in the fight like our first year."
The game Macdonald is referring to was a 26-20 win over the Broncos in September 2024. The win was the head coach's first of his career, though Payton was unhappy with how the Seahawks went about it, having strong words for Macdonald afterward.
Head coach Sean Payton of the Denver Broncos and head coach Mike Macdonald of the Seattle Seahawks shake hands after the game at Lumen Field on September 08, 2024 in Seattle, Washington. The Seahawks defeated the Broncos 26-20
Denver Broncos head coach Sean Payton claimed the Seattle Seahawks were cheating in 2024(Image: Photo by Alika Jenner/Getty Images)
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"We were trying to a lot of s--- going on and ... basically threatened to come out publicly and do it like a whole Patriot Spygate type of thing," Macdonald said.
"I'm sitting there like 'Oh my God like we didn't cheat like that.' We thought it was a Michigan thing or we had a plant and the whole thing and so we had to counter with him to say 'Hey look if you come out of this, we're gonna sue you because it's not true.'"
He noted that Payton eventually relented, though Macodnald likened his interaction with the head coach to the Cold War.
"That's not how we do business," he continued to Bensinger, "and so anyway so the season ends and he let it go and but it was like it was almost it was like it's like the Cold War. I'm gonna hit the button, I'm gonna hit the button, and we're gonna hit the button. None of us hit the button."
When the two men met each other again at the NFL Draft Combine, the two shared a moment though it was one that Macdonald believed he was the bigger man.
"I went for a run at the combine and so I'm literally getting out of the elevator at the Marriott there in Indy and soon as I opened the door at the floor that I'm at, here he comes in and I was kind of over him and he's like 'Hey, coach' and totally backed down in that moment," he concluded.
Since that point, both the Broncos and the Seahawks have achieved success, though Seattle has had more success, winning Super Bowl LX over the New England Patriots.
Meanwhile in Denver, Payton has led the Broncos to the postseason in two of the three seasons he's been at the helm.