The Seahawks blew a game against the Washington Commanders by giving away 21 points after turnovers. Today, they repeated the act in a damaging loss.
The 49ers are now 5-0 with a road-win tiebreaker over both the Rams and Seahawks. Look at their schedule. It’s a tantalising run for a team that has shown, somehow, that it can cope with back-breaking injury losses.
For the long term battle for the NFC West, this was more than just a mere disappointment. It impacts the division. The Seahawks have a far harder schedule than the 49ers coming up. It’s not a mountain to climb yet — but it could quickly turn into one if they’re not careful.
Let’s focus on the here and now though, rather than what might happen in the future. Seattle’s offense appears broken. Here’s why:
— Sam Darnold is playing badly. He’s throwing interceptions at a rapid rate. Tom Brady spent most of today’s game lambasting the way he played. He doesn’t look right — and it’s a concern. There will be people saying put in Drew Lock but this can’t be a musical chairs situation, all because Lock played a good game and a half in relief. What happens if Lock comes in and struggles? You’ve just created a load more drama within the quarterback room and it will seem like you’ve lost control. The Seahawks need their starting quarterback to up his game and get back on track. He simply has to improve immediately.
— The supporting cast surrounding Darnold also has to be way better. It felt like he was under pressure on every drop-back today — and that was without Nick Bosa playing. The offensive line had too many whiffs in pass-pro and wasn’t reliably mauling a banged-up opponent up front in the running game either. It still doesn’t excuse some truly baffling Darnold decisions but he surely has to be feeling the pinch given how often he had to try and extend plays today. This was supposed to be a unit ready to take the next step this year and after five games they’ve been a let down.
— The running back situation is a mess and we can safely say now that they’ve got this one wrong. They knew Zach Charbonnet wouldn’t be ready to start the season. I don’t think shopping in the bargain bin for insurance, simply to avoid losing a comp pick, was right. Emmanuel Wilson tries his hardest but he’s a thumping running back who hits the hole hard but never creates, pushes the pile or ever feels like he’ll produce explosive runs. Now he also has a fumble to his name. George Holani, unfortunately, doesn’t appear remotely close to being good enough. His fumble before half-time was back-breaking. Not only that, the way he dropped the football when faced with a potential touchdown catch-and-run was baffling. Granted the Seahawks complemented this duo with a first round pick but before they even got to the draft they should’ve added a better veteran than they did, to cover for Charbonnet. I suspect they’ll be deeply regretting that now. It wasn’t worth protecting a later round comp pick for this situation at running back.
— It’s a major concern that they seem totally and completely reliant on Jaxon Smith-Njigba. They cannot get the other weapons involved. Holani was the second leading receiver with four catches for 24 yards. Rashid Shaheed had another quiet day with two catches for 23 yards. Seattle is paying him $17m a year — $3m more than the 49ers are paying Mike Evans. This was supposed to be AJ Barner’s big third year yet he was basically a non-factor again — three catches for 20 yards. Cooper Kupp had two catches for 15 yards. Elijah Arroyo had one target and no receptions — while Tory Horton barely got on the field. It’s understandable that they feature Smith-Njigba — but it’s not like he had 15 targets today and everything funnelled through him. They only threw his way eight times. It all just seems broken. Either JSN does something great or there’s a problem. They aren’t blending all of their weapons into a coherent plan. They aren’t challenging opponents in any way really other than ‘try to cover this one great receiver’.
— Questions will understandably begin to be asked of the offensive coordinator. The buck ultimately stops with Brian Fleury, even if he can’t carry and throw the football for his players. When you’re turning the ball over a lot, aren’t getting key players involved in the passing game, can’t run the ball very well and your blocking is very average (at best) — you start to wonder if the man tasked with leading the offense is capable of figuring all of this out in his first gig with no prior play-calling or repair work experience.
It’s not just about the offense though. For example:
— The defense in three consecutive games has given up some key late drives. They made amends last week with a sack-fumble but today they couldn’t. It was painful watching Mike Evans constantly abuse Josh Jobe 1v1 with seemingly no thought to try something (or someone) different to cover Evans. The 49ers had lost all momentum and were on the ropes and still found a way to put 10 points on the board late on. Credit to them as much as anything but it did feel like the Seahawks were one stop away from blowing things open — and that was the moment they suddenly had no means of covering a very talented but visibly banged up 33-year-old.
— I still don’t think there’s enough off the edge. Byron Murphy had two great sacks today and you know what you’re going to get from Leonard Williams. I didn’t feel DeMarcus Lawrence, Derick Hall, Uchenna Nwosu or Dante Fowler as pass-rushers. None registered a sack. I appreciate the Seahawks are creative, physical and find different ways compared to most to create pressure. You just need some quickness and speed at times. It’s not there.
— Sometimes you can be too aggressive. I understand why the Seahawks used their timeouts at the end of the first half, thinking they could steal one last drive when trailing 14-13. However, you’d played really badly on offense and the 49ers’ punter had been sticking it on the 10-yard line consistently. Just let the clock run out, regroup, have the first possession to start the next half and go from there. Seattle’s desire to be aggressive led to the fumble in the end zone and the game suddenly racing to 21-13. I know hindsight is amazing but be honest — didn’t you just think as they were handing off to Holani, ‘don’t fumble!’. Sadly it was all so predictable.
The biggest concern is how all of this adds up. It’s three messy games in a row. Last season when they had bad defeats they would bounce back. I don’t think they are — if anything, they’re getting messier with each week.
Twelve months ago they were throwing the ball very well and with Ken Walker and Charbonnet you felt there was always a chance they’d work out the run. I’m not sure how you fix this offense on the fly. It feels very difficult to say, ‘stop throwing picks, stop fumbling and block better’. That’s the whole operation.
I’ve also scoured the OurLads depth charts looking for impactful trade options and I have to say — I’m struggling. To the extent that I don’t want them to make some overly aggressive, foolhardy trade chasing this season.
In the past this would be the time to just run through Marshawn Lynch. When the Eagles got back on track two years ago, they leaned on Saquon Barkley (who, I’ll remind people who want to trade for him, is currently injured).
The Seahawks are already reliant and leaning on Smith-Njigba and alone it isn’t working. It feels like they need a top playmaker in the backfield. Can Charbonnet provide that? Or a combo of Charbonnet and Price? Possibly — but I’m not overly optimistic, especially given Price’s indifferent start and we don’t know if Charbonnet will be able to play at a great level fresh off returning from injury.
If Ken Walker continues to play at the level he is with the Chiefs it’ll be all the more painful. He is leading their rushing attack and frankly, right now, is just the type of feature back the Seahawks need. I understand why he isn’t still in Seattle and I backed the decision not to break the bank to try and keep him. But it’s OK to say maybe I got that one wrong — and perhaps so did the team.
I genuinely hope I’m wrong but I fear this season is already heading in a certain direction. They are far too talented to be a bad football team. They might have too much to do, however, to be a great team.
I’m surprised by how sloppy they are, though. They’re taking a wrecking-ball to their own foundations in the form of turnovers — with no capability so far to turn the machine off and start repairing. This is crushing their identity, philosophy and the connected nature that made them the most complete football team a year ago, and ultimately Champions.
It might get worse before it gets better. You better believe Sean Payton will be treating Thursday night’s trip to Denver like his own private Super Bowl, given Bensinger-gate from a few weeks ago. Then it’s the Bears and Chiefs.
I said recently this could be a 2014-type season — some early adversity but then finding a way to bring it all together when it matters, just in time for a run. At the moment I’m not confident that’s what we’re witnessing. I think some of the problems are going to be a lot harder to fix — especially when you can’t just hand it off to Marshawn.
