Marshawn Lynch recalls grabbing NFL referee vs Chiefs to protect opponent - "N***a I ain't even thinking about football"

For many, Marshawn Lynch is synonymous with the Seattle Seahawks. He was the primary offensive weapon of the team's Legion of Boom era, and he won a Super Bowl and numerous other accolades during his first tenure there.

But for a brief period of time, he also played for the then-Oakland Raiders, his hometown team. And while he did not achieve much there, one moment from that period still stands out.

During a 2017 regular-season matchup against the Kansas City Chiefs, cornerback Marcus Peters contributed to a hit on quarterback Derek Carr. The Raiders' offensive line rushed Peters, but Lynch stood up for him.

Or at least he tried to, because in the process he shoved a referee and was ejected from that game and banned from the next.

Speaking on Tyreek Hill's podcast It Needed to be Said, Lynch discussed his mindset at the time of the incident:

"The thing is, you get programmed and they tell you, you gotta protect the shield type shit. But then I mean for me I'm wired the way I rock. N***a I ain't even thinking [about] football. I'm more so, I just see my little cousin getting into some shit and then the family just instantly clicked. So everything else didn't even matter."

He continued:

"I forget that we on a motherf****ng a national stage. All I knew was n***a that's my little cousin and as the big cousin, I got to protect you but otherwise what’s family for real though?"

Marshawn lynch talked about the time he protected Marcus Peters

Family over football 💯 twitter.com/i/web/status/1… https://t.co/iY4dlNGJgM

Is Marshawn Lynch really related to Marcus Peters? A look at former Seattle Seahawks running back's relatives

Marshawn Lynch has considered Marcus Peters his younger cousin ever since they grew up together in Oakland, but surprisingly, they are not related. Besides growing up in Oakland, the only other similarity they share is ending up in Seattle, as Peters went to the University of Washington at around the same time Lynch was establishing himself as a Seahawk.

However, Lynch does have a few former football players among his actual relatives. His uncle, Lorenzo, played eleven seasons in the NFL as a cornerback, lasting the longest with the Arizona Cardinals.

He also has three cousins who have played football. Robert Jordan was a teammate of his at UC Berkeley, playing wide receiver. Another pair of cousins, JaMarcus Russell and Josh Johnson, have each been a quarterback, with the former being one of the biggest draft busts in league history and the latter having played for the most teams in the league, at 14 (not counting preseason cuts).