On a Thursday, he was out on the practice fields of the Virginia Mason Athletic Center with a camera in hand, filming pass rush drills. And on a Friday, he was donning an NFL Network polo and preparing to be on air for one of NFL Network's training camp broadcasts providing coverage of the Seattle Seahawks.

He is a wearer of many hats in his professional life – on-air personality for NFL Network, Seahawks Legend, Get Got Pod co-host and the latest addition to that list: Seahawks scouting intern.

Michael Robinson is a man that stays busy.

"Me waking up every day with purpose, that's the best feeling in the world. I'm a guy that, if I don't have a lot going on and I feel like people are passing me in life, I don't like that feeling. So, I like to have a lot going on…I'm having fun. I can't ask for anything else."

It's not unusual to see former players around the facility on any given day – recent guests spotted on the sidelines, coaching up players during practices have been Marshawn Lynch, Kam Chancellor and Richard Sherman.

Robinson has been on the field, same as Lynch, Chancellor and Sherman, but has taken on a different role that he sees as a step towards a larger goal.

When he was signed by the Seahawks in 2010, the relationship he began to form with general manager John Schneider is one that Robinson says cemented an idea that Robinson already had in mind. Schneider, like any good general manager, had done his research on the Seahawks' latest free agency addition, the college quarterback turned NFL running back then fullback.

"I was blessed to study Mike coming out of college," Schneider said. "He was a really tough quarterback at Penn State. Really smart. Big time leader, and then went to San Francisco, made himself a fullback and I was tight with several coaches on that staff. Coach Mike McCarthy is one of my closest friends in the league and he just bragged about [Mike's] toughness and his leadership. Once he got here, I felt like I kind of somewhat had a relationship with him a little bit too. Scot McCloughan had been their general manager in San Francisco, and we had just hired him to be a senior personnel guy. So, I got to know, through Scot, Mike on a personal level fairly well."

What Schneider's research didn't show him though was how integral Robinson would grow to be in helping be a voice between players and Schneider himself.

"He was always one of those guys that I would pick his brain about the team and how the guys were doing," Schneider said. "Who needed a little pick me up or who needed some help and get his feel on the vibe of the team, of the locker room, how it's going with everybody. We just had a relationship over the years."

It was those conversations that laid the foundation for the start of something that would begin to come to fruition 10 years later.

"I always thought he'd be a really good head coach."

On September 3, 2010, Robinson signed his contract with Seattle. He remembers walking with Schneider to his office and recalls Schneider telling him, "You're a guy that we want to be the foundation of how we build this program."

"I had never had somebody that high ranking of an official say something like that to me," Robinson said.

Those words meant a lot to him, and Schneider would follow through on those words. Robinson helped pave the way on the field for one of Seattle's most iconic running backs in Lynch and prove to be a reliable player when Schneider needed a temperature check on the Seahawks' locker room.

"He's an incredible communicator, always right to the point. Thoughtful, empathetic, loyal. He's just one of those people you could tell his heart's in the right place. Just the football knowledge – college quarterback to NFL, West Coast fullback, special teams star. We won a world championship together. He just knows ball."

Those years as a player showed Schneider that Robinson had what it took to work on the other side of football when the time came.

"I always thought he'd be a really good head coach," Schneider said. "And he's like, 'Yeah, I don't know about the coaching part yet.'"

It's not that Robinson didn't see himself working in football, it's that he saw himself working towards being a general manager of a football team one day.

"I want to build something," Robinson said.

During his playing years, Robinson created a YouTube channel, called the "Real Rob Report," giving fans an authentic look at the players and giving the athletes a voice. After retiring from the NFL, Robinson started working as an analyst for NFL Network and has enjoyed a successful media career that he started in 2014.

"Media was something that I wanted to do," he said. "And I have a great media career, but even in the media career, there is some part of being a team, being part of a team, being a part of building something, that you miss."

Schneider added, "He's much like John Lynch in San Francisco. He said he just misses the camaraderie; he misses the team, he missed that locker room aspect and building things and competing. That's what's driven him."

What he was missing eventually led him back to the football field.

"I still have a media career I love, but being a part of something bigger than myself, always being a forever fullback, helping people be the best version of themselves, helping them cross the goal line is something that is intriguing to me."

During the spring, Robinson was in town for a rookie event and was presented with the opportunity by Schneider to come back as an intern.

Robinson said Schneider told him, "Look man, you know you can dip your toe in it, just kind of see if you like it, and you'll go from there."

"Over the last several years, he's hit me up a couple times about [if he] could do a job shadow," Schneider said. "I was like 'Let's do it.' Let's do a job shadow for a minicamp and then see if that's something that, after the weekend you're interested [in]. We have an internship program for training camp and you're doing [broadcast for] our preseason games anyway, so see if you're interested in that."

Of course, Robinson enjoyed minicamp enough that he made his way back to become a scouting intern.

"Through my playing days, and as I've gone into media, he's always been a resource," Robinson said. "When I have questions, not just to help me do my job, but I'm talking about questions about life, he's always been there. He probably couldn't have been a better mentor for me personally to do this job."

"It's just been awesome now," Schneider said. "He's just one of the guys. He's in the draft room grinding like crazy, grinding film and studying and coming out here and filming, helping the video guys film and taking guys to the airport, picking guys up at the hospital for imaging and he's just diving in. Getting a feel for the football operation."

Being a former player, Robinson has a perspective that not many NFL general managers can say they have. There are only three current GM's that are former players – the aforementioned Lynch in San Francisco, Martin Mayhew with the Washington Commanders and Ran Carthon in Tennessee. Chicago Bears' general manager Ryan Poles signed with the Bears as an undrafted free agent but was cut before the regular season.

His first-hand experience of tough, and sometimes uncomfortable conversations about money, contracts and roster decisions, gives him a different level of empathy that only someone who has been through those situations can have.

"This is a business, big business," Robinson said. "This is a $20 billion dollar industry. You have to be able to connect with a player on a level that he knows you're not trying to get over on him, because players are merit based. 'If I ball out, I should get X.' In business, it isn't always merit based, business has rules. Business has salary cap and things you have to deal with and work with. I believe if a player can look across the table and see himself talking to himself, it can add some credibility. It can add some ease to the relationship of this business that we get to be in."

And it's not only his playing background that helps him relate to players. He can also apply his experience on the field to helping an organization.

"I realized I help people cross the goal line. That's what fullbacks do," Robinson said. "I know people always see head coach and GM relationships as, if they're the head coach the GM is usually higher on the totem pole. I don't see it that way. I see it as partners. My job is to, if I would ever sit in that general manager job, my job would be to help the head coach be the best version of themselves they can possibly be. A servant leadership, that's really what I'm all about, so that's where that fullback background comes back into play."

Robinson said, the internship has been "phenomenal."

"I learn something every single day, great group of people that work upstairs and I just want to help. I'm one of the only former NFL players up there. So just giving them an idea [of] how players see the game has been rewarding for me. It's been awesome."