SEATTLE -- Seahawks coach Pete Carroll addressed speculation that he may walk away at the end of the season, tweeting Sunday that he will not.
People talking about retirement... I ain't old enough to think about retiring! 🕺
— Pete Carroll (@PeteCarroll) December 31, 2017
When asked about the tweet after Seattle's regular-season finale against the Arizona Cardinals, which Seattle lost 26-24, Carroll said, "That was a good tweet, didn't you think? It was right on point."
At 66, Carroll is the NFL's oldest head coach, but he has an exuberance that belies his age. The retirement speculation had surfaced in recent weeks.
The Seahawks (9-7) missed the postseason, ending a streak of five straight playoff appearances. Seattle needed a win and a loss by the Atlanta Falcons to make the playoffs as the No. 6 seed. The Falcons defeated the Carolina Panthers 22-10.
"I think this game today was almost a microcosm of this season," Carroll said. "The slow starts, the getting in our own way making it hard on us at times where it really wasn't about the opponent, it was about us. There's a lot of stuff that kinda showed up again today."
The Seahawks made the playoffs in six of Carroll's eight seasons in Seattle. They won Super Bowl XLVIII in blowout fashion over the Denver Broncos and came up just short of repeating as champions in Super Bowl XLIX against the New England Patriots.
The loss Sunday also ended the Seahawks' streak of five straight seasons with at least 10 wins. The team had only five seasons with double-digit victories from its inception in 1976 to when Carroll arrived in 2010.
"It's a difficult year and that's because of the guys that we were unable to keep with us," Carroll said, an apparent reference to how Seattle lost cornerback Richard Sherman, strong safety Kam Chancellor, defensive end Cliff Avril and others to season-ending injuries. "They were in the locker room today, but they couldn't help us. It's just unfortunate that we weren't quite there to get it all together the way that we want it to."
Carroll signed a contract extension in the summer of 2016 that runs through the 2019 season.