Seahawks coach Pete Carroll held his end-of-season press conference on Monday to talk about the season that was and also look ahead to what he and the team is expecting to be a bright future.

Carroll also gave updates on several Seahawks players who finished the season on injured reserve, including two of his defense's top players, safety Jamal Adams, who had surgery in September to repair a torn quadriceps tendon, and linebacker Jordyn Brooks, who will have surgery this week on the ACL injury he suffered in Seattle's Week 17 win over the Jets.

On Adams, who was with the team in Santa Clara for Saturday's Wild Card game against the 49ers, as well as in Seattle to see a win over his former team, the Jets, Carroll said, "Jamal was with us here this weekend, and he's finally started to move. He's up on his feet, he's on the treadmill and those things getting started. It's still a long recovery for him. We'll go into the summer with him still getting back. We'll just have to wait and see how it goes, but that's not one where he's going to bounce back and be ready next month or something like that. It's going to take him a while."

While Carroll wasn't making excuses for a defensive performance that wasn't up to his or the team's standard this year, he did note that losing Adams in Week 1 after planning on him being such a big part of the defense was a factor.

"The last two years it did affect us, because we had we had a real plan of how we wanted to utilize him," Carroll said. "He's a terrific ballplayer, he would be a big factor, and the design of the scheme was all set up with that in mind. But I'm not blaming anything on that; we'll take advantage of it when we have him again, and he'll make the most of it."

Carroll said Brooks will have surgery this week, and that more will be known about his timeline after that.

"He hasn't been operated on yet," Carroll said. "They've waited. I think he's going in (for surgery) on the 19th, so we won't know anything until then."

For now, Carroll is taking an optimistic approach on Brooks, and whenever Seattle's middle linebacker is back, the Seahawks will count on him to be a big factor on defense.

"We're going to count on him being ready to go, but I'm saying that in all optimism, because they haven't gone in and taken a look at what it looks like yet," Carroll said. "It's a long recovery, it's late in the year, it's a hard race against time for him to make it, but he's such a well-conditioned guy and he's such a good worker and his mentality is so strong, I think he'll get as much out of it as you can. He's a really big factor. He needed the time, as we changed principles and stuff that he did, he needed the time to really grow with it. He was making a bunch of tackles, but he'll be better, he'll be much improved… Jordyn, really, he's a centerpiece, he's such a good player, and we'll continue to lean on him that way. So, fingers crossed that he'll make it back and be ready to go for the season."

Tight end Will Dissly was placed on injured reserve late in the season with what Carroll called an unusual knee injury, and it's not yet clear if he will need surgery or not.

"This is one we don't know," Carroll said. "What they're doing right now is they're waiting to see how he heals in regards to surgery. Does he need surgery or not? We don't know that yet. I think they said it was going to be a couple of months of rehab to see if just heals up so they don't have to go in and do something. We've never had the injury before—I can't tell you what it is—but it's in an unusual place and an unusual return, because we don't have a background on it. So we'll just wait and see. He's doing well, he's making progress and all of that. He's feeling more comfortable; he's not on the crutches as much, but we're not going to know for a while.

Running back Rashaad Penny is making good progress in his return from an ankle injury, and while he is set to become a free agent when the new league year begins, he should be ready to go if he does re-sign with Seattle.

"He's making really good progress," Carroll said. "He was hoping if we went deep in the playoffs that he would have a chance, that's how positive he is about it. But the ankle repair he had is intricate, the high ankle thing where they're tying stuff together—they've got some really cool technology that makes him stable and ready to come back. He feels pretty good about. So he'll be back for camp and all that if we can get him back, so he should have a good solid recovery."

Defensive tackle Bryan Mone is looking at a long recovery following surgery to repair a knee injury he suffered last month. Carroll said Mone was diagnosed with an ACL injury after it happened, but the surgery revealed more issues.

"He had a difficult surgery," Carroll said. "We've got to wait and see. There was more stuff going on than we thought, he had some old stuff in there probably that was part of that. So he's going to have a good battle to get back. I don't know what the timeframe is on it, but it's going to take a while."

Outside linebacker Alton Robinson spent the year on injured reserve, the result of a knee injury suffered during the preseason. Carroll said there have been some complications in his comeback, delaying his return.

"There are some issues with his return," Carroll said. "It's taken him a while. I don't have the specifics on it, but I know it has been a struggle. I don't have a good update for you, but he's still in the process and he's a ways from getting back and making it back to full speed… It's a knee injury that there were some complications in there in the return, because it's just taken him some time. He's worked out hard at it, but he's not full speed running yet."

Rookie outside linebacker Tyreke Smith spent his entire first season on injured reserve, but should be fully recovered when the team gets back to work this spring.

"He should be able to be fully recovered and ready to go," Carroll said. "We didn't get anything done this year, but good hopes for the future. He's an active football player, he could be factor for us."

Carroll revealed that linebacker Ben Burr-Kirven, who injured his knee in the 2021 preseason, is dealing with nerve issues that have complicated his return, but said that the former University of Washington standout is still trying to make it back.

"He's in a little bit of an experimental mode, the surgeries that he's had and the process that he's going through," Carroll said. "He is making progress, he's always in the weightroom with us, he's always here working, really with a tremendous mentality. The nerve issues, there's really intricate stuff going on, so he's had to have a really good attitude to stay in the fight, and he is, he's in the fight, and he's planning on getting back out there. We're going to give him every chance, if he can do it, this is going to be the place he does it. So we'll see what happens, but he's upbeat, he's positive, and he's made improvements in an area that sometimes you don't make any."