Former Seattle Seahawks head coach Mike Holmgren joined KJR’s Dave “Softy” Mahler this morning to talk about his renewed interest in returning to the NFL next year in 2010.

Holmgren said he’s in Salt Lake City babysitting his granddaughter Emma. Holmgren’s daughter Calla, a doctor who lives in Utah, joined his wife Kathy on a relief effort to work in refugee camps in Uganda.

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I covered the news conference today in Seattle announcing that KIRO, which has partnerships with both the Seahawks and the Mariners, is going to an all-sports format on April 1, competing directly with KJR. Their launch is meant to coincide directly with the start of baseball season.

The above photo includes Chuck Armstrong at the far left, KIRO GM and VP Dave Pridemore, KIRO VP/market manager Carl Gardner and Seahawks CEO Tod Leiweke.

KIRO is becoming an ESPN station, which for all intents and purposes means that KJR no longer is able to air ESPN material. What this means for John Clayton I am not sure. When I reached him at home, he did not want to comment. He has had his Sports Saturday show for almost two decades and is very proud of what he has been able to develop. KJR program director Rich Moore said he thinks Clayton will stay with KJR. "John is a very big part of our radio station, and we want him to continue that tradition. We anticipate that he will be able to do that."

KIRO has not announced what shows it is going to do or what talent it is going to hire, saying only that they are going to build more shows around the Seahawks and Mariners, obviously, but also do its fair share of local programming. They will hire a program director over the next few weeks and then start zeroing in on hosts and co-hosts.

Carl Gardner was pretty clear that KIRO, owned by Bonneville, a Mormon-owned company, is going to have a different flavor than some of the KJR shows, particularly Mitch's morning show, which sometimes focuses on women. "Bonneville has a high standard," Gardner said. "Our view is you can be entertaining and funny without being blue."

This was forwarded to me by the PR folks at SIRIUS; it's a transcript of Holmgren's conversation with Adam Schein re: Packers QB Brett Favre.

Host, Adam Schein: “What’s your read on the entire [Favre/Green Bay] situation?”

Mike Holmgren: “I’ve purposely stayed away from commenting and, certainly, picking sides because I know all the principals involved and I like them all and they’re friends of mine. To me, the whole thing, I’m a little saddened by it. I think there are a lot of wonderful stories in the league going on right now and that thing has seemed to dominate, pretty much, the airwaves. I like them both. I understand the Packers’ situation. I understand Brett’s situation. It’s a tough one.”

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Here is their release:

SIRIUS NFL Radio - the only radio channel devoted to the NFL 24 hours a day, 365 days a year - will broadcast live from Seattle Seahawks training camp in Kirkland, WA today, August 4.

Veteran SIRIUS host Adam Schein and former NFL defensive back Solomon Wilcots will host “The SIRIUS Blitz” live from 9 am – 12 pm PT, exclusively on SIRIUS NFL Radio channel 124.

The visit is part of the fourth annual SIRIUS NFL Radio Training Camp Tour, which features live on-site broadcasts at all 32 NFL team training camps from July 26 – August 14. SIRIUS hosts will provide an expert look at every team, interview players, coaches and franchise executives, and evaluate everything from the performances of fresh-out-of college rookies to the intense head-to-head competitions for starting roles. All shows air exclusively on SIRIUS NFL Radio.

First, I am standing in for Elise Woodward on KJR tonight, hosting from 7-10. There will be plenty of Seahawks talk if you want to call in and chat about whatever is on your mind. There also has been some Sonics discussion on this site in the past week, so that is open for discussion, as well.

Second, I had a funny Chris Gray anecdote to relay. I was interviewing him yesterday for the story I wrote today about him being the player rep at a time that labor strife can be seen in the distance. I thought it was interesting because while he is the player rep now, he is not even going to be around when the negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement come to a head.

Anyway, as I was interviewing him, Walter Jones comes walking by with an enormous goofy grin on his face. And Chris Gray says, "What do you think of my clothes?" I tell him they are sporty, a nice golf shirt. Whatever. He says, "What do you think of the jeans?" They were clearly designer jeans, no creases, a little long, hanging over his sparkling white tennis shoes. I didn't really know what to say. Really, what was I supposed to say? Apparently, the offensive linemen all chipped in to buy Gray new clothes so he could be more stylish. He said his 9-year-old daughter was killing him at home because he looked so un-Gray-like. She said she thought he was going to break out some hand gestures used by rappers. Pretty funny.

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Seahawks defensive lineman Craig Terrill was on KJR with Ian Furness this afternoon, promoting his CD and discussing some things Hawks. Take a listen during a slow news time.

The Seahawks' GM and its vice president of player personnel met with the media a few minutes ago, and I have to say not a great deal more was revealed than when the beat writers met with Ruskell last week.

One of the questions I asked was how does the Rocky Bernard situation affect Ruskell's approach to this draft. He didn't answer the question per se, but did say that they have been targeting defensive tackles all along anyway. He said he operates under the assumption that you have to rejuvenate the offensive and defensive lines each year, even if you feel good about them, so that is a position they are likely to take anyway. Ruston said defensive ends are stronger in this draft than tackles, but they are looking at both.

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Mike Holmgren is speaking with Dave Mahler and Hugh Millen on KJR in a few minutes. If you miss the interview, I'll post the podcast later.

Thanks to KJR for passing along audio from my conversation with John Clayton this morning. We touched on all the major issues facing this team heading into training camp and the 2007 season. He even got me to predict a victory total for this team. Listen here.

We'll make available two recent interviews, one from KIRO radio late last week, another from footballguys.com this afternoon. Thanks to KIRO for passing along the audio. Thanks to footballguys.com for sending a link to their podcast.

A couple of people across the state in Spokane still admit to knowing me from my days working over there. KXLY's Dennis Patchin and Julie Scott are two of them. They were nice enough to pass along audio from our conversation this afternoon. We analyzed the overreaction to Shaun Alexander's comments about his formerly injured and possibly still-imperfect foot, in addition to the situations at tight end and safety. We finished by discussing what I considered to be one of the Hawks' primary areas for concern in 2007.

That was one of the questions we addressed tonight with New York Vinnie on KIRO. Thanks to NYV and KIRO for passing along audio. For the record, D.J. Hackett showed last season that he's the favorite to start at split end now that Darrell Jackson is gone and Deion Branch is moving to flanker. Nate Burleson will be heard on this one, and Bobby Engram is expected to play extensively in the three-wide personnel groupings. We'll have more on that subject early Tuesday morning.