Be it lack of experience, weight or height, Seahawks rookie wide receiver Deon Butler knows the reasons why some say he won’t succeed this year. But he also knows he has an ace in the hole, a secret weapon: He’s really fast.

“Obviously, my trademark is going to be the speed that I bring to the table,” Butler said.

That trademark was quite clear at the NFL Draft Scouting Combine prior to the draft. The 5-foot-10, 182-pound Butler scorched the turf with a time of 4.38 seconds in the 40-yard dash — fourth-best among wide receivers.

The time bolstered Butler’s draft stock and obviously caught the Seahawks’ attention. The team made a draft-day trade to be in position to select Butler in the third round (91st overall).

For Butler, the Combine was simply another step in proving the experts wrong about him.

The early turning point was in Butler’s senior year when he met wide receiver Eddie Royal in a playoff game.

“We had a good battle back and forth,” Butler said. “After that, I just felt like if he’s supposed to be the top prospect in the state, I shouldn’t be far off.”

Royal was listed by most scouts as a three-star player and Virginia’s best wide-receiver prospect. He committed to Virginia Tech and now plays for the Denver Broncos.

Meanwhile, Butler found himself with no lofty recruiting ranking, no hype and no big-time scholarship offer, largely because of his size.

“I’ve been too small since high school,” Butler said with a smile. Then with a more serious tone: “But you just go out and play football. I’ve never let it hold me back before. I was too small in college, too. I feel like if you go out and play football and make plays that will stand for itself.”

Instead of accepting his fate as a near-forgetten product of the high school football recruiting machine, Butler took a chance. Bypassing several scholarship offers to smaller schools, he walked on at Penn State.

Once there, the highlights came fast and furious. After redshirting his first year, Butler broke four school freshman records (season receptions, yards, touchdowns and single-game receiving yards). He maintained his success through his time as a Nittany Lion and eventually surpassed former Seahawk Bobby Engram as the school’s all-time receptions leader by the time he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in crime, law and justice.

To augment his degree, Butler got a different sort of summer job than most college graduates. He spent the summer interning with the Philadelphia Police Department’s Crime Scene Unit.

“It was pretty real,” Butler said. “We were right there on the scene with the real dead bodies and the real grieving families.”

Many of the families he worked with had children and Butler said seeing the effect on them was the hardest part of the job.

“It just puts life in perspective. You realize the tragedies that are going on,” he said. “While you’re in your bubble of success and everything that’s going on, there’s a whole other life going on. It makes you more thankful for what you have ahead of you.”

What’s ahead for Butler? Training camp, preseason and Seattle’s first regular-season game, Sept. 13 against the St. Louis Rams.