This game felt a lot like watching the Seahawks in 2013-14.
Georgia, determined to run the ball and utilise a point guard quarterback, started slowly. They gave up some cheap points on a fumbled punt and had to right-the-ship with a 10-minute scoring drive.
As the game progressed they took control, built their lead and appeared set to pull away from Notre Dame. Then they gave up a touchdown and things became unnecessarily close at the end — but they held on.
Overall though it wasn’t a particularly fun game to watch. In fact for long stretches it was dull. Frustrating penalties, injuries, six fumbles and a lack of big names making plays.
D’Andre Swift just about did enough to impress. He drove for the hard yards, had the burst to turn the corner and looked sharp for 98 yards and a touchdown on 18 carries. In the second half Jake Fromm found some rhythm and succeeded with a series of fades and back-shoulder throws to move the ball. He’s not a dynamic, big armed gun-slinger but he can manage games well enough — while making just enough plays — to be an effective quarterback at this level.
Aside from that there’s not much to say. I was really keen to watch Isaiah Wilson the Georgia right tackle and he didn’t start due to a lingering injury but came into the game after half time. He didn’t look 100% but, along with Andrew Thomas, kept Notre Dame’s edge rushers quiet. The overall performance of the Georgia offense improved in the second half. Julian Okwara was anonymous, adding to my scepticism that he’s worth a high pick.
Notes from elsewhere…
— Alabama has started with the usual milquetoast schedule. In their latest easy win (against Southern Miss), Jerry Jeudy and Henry Ruggs showed off their speed and YAC ability. Ruggs had 148 yards on four catches and two touchdowns. Jeudy also had a pair of scores to go with 96 yards on six catches. Najee Harris had another 110 yards while Tua Tagovailoa threw for five touchdowns. Trevon Diggs — a genuine top-15 talent — tracked the ball brilliantly yet again to make an interception. Alabama faces Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Tennessee and Arkansas before their first real test against LSU.
— Joe Burrow scored six touchdowns for LSU against Vanderbilt and continues to build his profile as a legit NFL prospect. He’s looked incredibly on point so far this year. He needs to keep it rolling for a LSU team who are a similar to Georgia in terms of talent and make-up. If he extends his early-season form into a SEC run he could easily be on the NFL radar by the new year.
— Speaking of milquetoast starts to a season, here’s Ohio State and their latest blowout against Miami Ohio. Jeffrey Okudah had an interception as he builds towards going in the top-15. J.K. Dobbins was rested a bit today and only had 52 yards on eight carries and a touchdown. Dobbins is elusive, gets to the edge quickly, accelerates through space and breaks tackles. He’s tough to bring down and a special athlete. K.J. Hill had two catches for 78 yards and a big touchdown. Binjimen Victor had three catches for 42 yards and a touchdown. Chase Young had two more sacks taking his total to seven in four games.
— Of all the top teams, Clemson might have the weakest schedule this year. The took apart Charlotte with the big names receiving a lot of rest time. Tee Higgins had one touchdown catch for 58 yards and that was his day done. Travis Etienne had 11 carries for 61 yards and a touchdown.
— What’s happened to Jim Harbaugh? In the early San Francisco years you could make a case for him being the best coach in football at the time. Then a collapse for the Niners and now five years into his spell at Michigan, things just aren’t working. They were torn apart by Wisconsin. Jonathan Taylor — a legit top-45 prospect — ran for 203 yards on 23 carries (adding two touchdowns). Taylor is typically physical and robust but has a sneaky turn of speed when he finds an opening. Tight end Jake Ferguson — a terrific athlete and possibly high-ish pick — had three catches for 28 yards.
— I think I’ve seen enough of Kenny Willekes now to judge he isn’t a top draft prospect. His production is great at Michigan State with a ton of TFL’s and sacks. Yet on tape there’s just nothing especially great about his athletic profile. Very little burst, struggles to change direction in space. He gives a full-on effort every week but he’s not a high draft pick. He’s not twitchy enough for Seattle. I watched the game against Northwestern and he only had a couple of quarterback hurries.
— Javon Kinlaw had another sack for South Carolina against Missouri. That’s four in four games. He’s really boosting his draft stock this year and should be one of the first defensive tackles taken in the draft.
— Steven Montez continued his switch between fantastic and frustrating. He led Colorado to a significant win against Arizona State, completing 23/30 passing for 337 yards and three touchdowns. He was practically flawless in the game. He did it all despite Laviska Shenault having yet another quiet game. His only impact was one catch for 23 yards. Apparently he left the game with a concussion. Arizona State’s Eno Benjamin ran for 83 yards on 20 carries and had two touchdowns.
— I’ve not seen the Washington game against BYU but I noticed tight end Hunter Bryant had four catches for 49 yards including a 22-yarder. He continues to keep making explosive plays.
— I have Auburn vs Texas A&M on record to watch later but top draft prospect Derrick Brown had two sacks and three TFL’s in the game. He also deflected two passes. He’s a stud.
— In quarterback watch, Justin Herbert completed 19/24 for 259 yards and three touchdowns in a win against Stanford. The Oregon O-line struggled in the game. Jordan Love helped Utah State defeat San Diego State, completing 30/47 for 293 yards and no touchdowns.
You can now support Seahawks Draft Blog via Patreon by clicking the tab below.
I am no Coug fan, but with Falk and Minshew both starting for NFL teams today and 9 Air RAID quarterbacks starting around the league, I would nominate Anthony Gordon and his nearly 1900 passing yards as worthy of mention in the QB watch section.
He’s played a handful of games. The two QB’s notes are being projected as top-10 picks.
I wasn’t taking you to task. Just pointing out his blazing start for a program that is producing NFL worthy QBs.
Aaaand, once again, just as Rob predicted:
(P.S. Typo on “BYU”)
Will be interesting to see what happens now. Whether the price lowers, whether the Jags stand pat and whether Ramsey forces the issue.
Just got to wait it out like w/Clowney:
https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/27670539/sources-jags-not-interested-trading-ramsey
Except if we really want him, I think we’re going to have to outbid the Chiefs.
Predictions for tonight’s score, anyone? (gimme halftime and final score!)
I’ll say the Seahawks get off to their usual slow start on offense, with our OL giving up several sacks to the Saints’ good DL before Shotty turns again to the quick passing game. The Saints manage to surprise us in the first half with some 2 QB packages (including the now obligatory flea flicker…), Alvin Kamara splits out wide and burns KJ for a TD. The Seahawks score thanks to a bomb to Lockett, and the score is 10-10 heading into halftime.
We receive the 2nd half kick-off and promptly march down the field with our quick passing game taking pressure off of RW. Up by a TD, Pete lets the pass rush loose on Teddy B and he looks like a confused rookie again. The Saints manage to move the ball a bit thanks to Michael Thomas, but it only results in a few more long-range field goals for them. The home crowd behind our running game is too much for them to handle throughout the 2nd half. Seahawks win 27-19.
…And Seahawks twitter explodes with demands they rebuild the OL
…Prosise has a couple good plays and Seahawks twitter uses that to jump all over Penny again
Sorry. I didn’t sleep well last night and woke up grumpy.
Twitter is at its worst during a game.
No need to get hysterical over the slightest criticism of Wilson. I never said he was responsible for the loss–just that he failed miserably to live up to his pay status. And now we hear it was he who audibles to a non-play-action pass on fourth down on his own 28, with all receivers on the short side of the field, then dramatically overthrew to his fifth-string WR when even a pick would be better than an incompletion! Mind numbing indeed! For 35 million, more is to be expected!
I agree on a slow start. I think after two weeks of bad starts on the O-line, the Saints will cause us some problems too with their D-line. I could see something similar to a week ago. I think the Saints players will raise their game with Brees out.
I also think we’ll need some time to ‘see what they’re doing’ on offense minus Brees. Might be some things that catch us out. Adjustments will be big there.
I suspect once we’ve got a handle on it we should, hopefully, be able to handle their offense.
My main hope is to see some consistency on offense today. There have been some real high points so far but also a fair bit of negativity (O-line play, run boom or bust). Getting the offense to look like it did at the end of the 2018 regular season would be a nice development over the coming games.
Big game for the pass rush too with Clowney and Ansah both playing.
I’m not sure I’d call the Oho State schedule a cupcake like some of the other big name teams. Cincinnatti’s record is 2-1 ( they’re an 11 game winner last year as well as a bowl game winner with 85% of starters back), Indiana is 3-1, FAU is 2-2, and Miami of Ohio (there’s your MAC cupcake) is 1-3.
Justin Fields is a QB to watch although he’s still a sophomore. 13 passing TDs and 0 interceptions. Also 6 rushing TDs on the season.
Cincinnati beat a bad UCLA and Miami Ohio. Indiana beat UConn, Ball State and EIU. FAU beat Ball State and Wagner.
I saw all three games and it was like watching men against boys. It’s a poor schedule to start the year. I’m not having a go at Ohio State just being honest about their opponents so far.
Fields has had a good start but the Ohio State offense is mass production and every QB has had great stats for years. He’s also not played a difficult opponent yet. So a good start but still lots to prove in terms of the NFL.
Despite being low-scoring, I thought the Notre Dame-UGA game was awesome. Two tough defenses flying around making some big plays. I thought it was awesome to see how much impact the crowd and stadium atmosphere had as well. It really was like watching a classic Hawks game at home.
I’m not sure when Isaiah Wilson returned to the game, but I have a sneaking suspicion that its around the time that the UGA offense started breaking off some bigger plays and would help to explain why Okwara ended up having such a quiet night (he started off pretty strong early on).
I like a good battle most of the time — I just thought this one lacked any kind of inspiration. It ended up being a toil early on, then Georgia started to pull away but allowed Notre Dame to stick around enough to nearly steal it at the end. Fromm’s production was almost exclusively back-shoulder and fade throws. Plus there were so many fumbles. It made for a messy game.
Yeah, first half especially seemed pretty dull but it felt a lot more cat-and-mouse to me in the second half. Just a really cool environment to see a game played in and I was genuinely up out of my seat on that last Notre Dame drive. That UGA safety, Reed I think his name was, was incredible.
College football needs more games like that one, not crap like Ohio St-Miami Ohio
Completely agree on the last point.
First few weeks of the season have been especially light on meaningful games.
Agreed that UGA safety J.R. Reed, son of NFL WR great Jake Reed, was incredible. 7 tackles, 3 PBU’s plus he covered a ton of ground for a big time pick. Haven’t been able to find any previous testing numbers on him, but Reed looks plenty athletic.
Baltimore is dangerous in the AFC.
They look dangerous at the moment but I wonder what happens later in the year. No great pass rushers and teams will settle on Lamar taking away the scrambling and forcing him to pass. Will be a nice challenge for him in that situation.
Also worth noting Baltimore played KC very close a year ago. Might be a good matchup for them.
And suddenly it’s 21-6 and you remember the Ravens played the Dolphins and Cardinals in the first two weeks…
^ I came here to say thia but knew in my heart it had already been said
And…Baltimore has exited the chat
Arrowhead is louder than the Clink 😪
The Clink is now full of Hipsters with beards using their cell phones. It’s not even close to the mid 2000’s or even the 80’s in the Dome…..Sad actually.
Not a surprise. Arrowhead has always been really loud. I think the Clink hasn’t been as loud the past few years as we’ve added quite a few fair weather casual fans after our back to back SB years. Still a ton of die hard long time fans there, but definitely a lot of newer fans too. If the Hawks get a home game(s) this year in the playoffs I think the Clink will be really intimidating.
My guy Mecole Hardman went to the perfect team for his skill set.
Look at Detroit. Almost like Darrell Bevell was never actually bad.
*whispers* he wasn’t
I feel terrible for Keanu Neal. Another non-contact injury.
Same. Such a good player too.
Eagles have toiled for three straight weeks.
Green Bay have started well then faded on offense for three straight weeks.
Neither team looks as strong as expected.
Especially Philly.
A part of me feels like Dallas is gonna make some noise in the NFC this year. The other part feels like they’ll find a way to sh** the bed.
Agreed. Could see 13-3 for Dallas and #1 seed… then losing in the divisional round.
Philly’s defense so vanilla today.
That Philly secondary is not very good.
So far I’m really liking what Detroit has going on/building. Someone like WR Henry Ruggs in that offense would make them lethal.
Not sold on Detroit personally. Threw away the Cards game. Nearly threw this one away. The Chargers game last week was very strange. They’ll probably 2-3-1 in a month.
I do agree they blew the Cards game. And IDK if I’m necessarily buying in, but I like what they’re building over there. That’s another secondary that needs patching up.
1st and LJ Collier (healthy scratch tonight.) for Ramsey. Could /would you. Meets their request two 1sts.
What’s your take on seahawks targeting/prioritizing WR in the draft?
I think it’s unlikely unless the value at the position is strong where they pick. Just made some investments at WR and have key free agents elsewhere.
The first friggin play… 😡😥
Penalty, Run, Run, Punt return for TD
Checking into a 2 yard run on 2 & 15 was sweet
You forgot the screen pass, and the breakdown of the OL…
Wow. Seahawks special teams looking like Cougs SP from last night. Terrible coverage
Uh………………wha????
×2
Ok…now we’re talking
Back to back mistakes by BBK. False start to move the punt back 5 yards, then a total whiff on the downfield coverage.
Yuck start
Ways to lose 101 against backup QB’s:
– Give up cheap points on special teams
Has Austin Davis taught us nothing
12th man wreaking havoc at least…
Now we’re cooking.
All Lockett does…??
Really makes it look easy…
Ugo Amadi…holy cow! He’s a future starter on this defense.
Hope he’s solid package player and ST depth until he prices himself out, personally.
Nice by Amadi. Building up a repertoire on ST.
Stinks about Carson slipping all over the place. Has really set us back on a few otherwise promising drives.
Defense is playing very, very well so far.
Absolutely
KJ has looked great. Spry. Like he’s got an extra spring in his step.
And if anyone doubts the value of special teams… it’s equalising the game for the Saints so far.
Turnovers and special teams.
And people don’t like PC’s approach.
Fantastic play by Green and QJeff to get NO off the field
Carson. Come on. Hes gonna lose his job if he’s not careful
How to lose to back-up QBs, revisited
#1 give up cheap points on special teams
#2 give up cheap points on turnovers
The Saints haven’t done anything on offense and have 14 points.
Seahawks have no business being 14-7. Same through three weeks so far. Messing about and giving the opponent a chance to beat you.
Turnovers by the Defense, TOP, Explosive plays are the remedy
So…should Carson be benched now??? This is a problem teams are keying on.
Needs to wrap up with two hands if he anticipates contact.
Great play by Apple though.
Honestly ok if we lose this. As long as a message is sent about cleaning up the game. Carson should sit. Hell, he shouldn’t start next week. Doghouse time for him.
What a nutty game so far. Saints special teams and a fumble have been the difference. Can’t complain about too much else about the Hawks.
Take comments from Weeks 1&2, copy and paste. NO don’t have 60 yards of offence yet.
It’s getting sad with Carson. His confidence might be shot.
These next few weeks, if he’s healthy, will tell us everything about Rashad Penny.
I’m a HUGE Carson fan too. Hurts that all that talent has become a liability. Can’t keep putting him on the field at this point.
Uh…what???
Grrr… pulling Iupati is not a good idea…
This is just a real strange first half. I don’t know if you can complain about either the defense or the offense outside of the fumble. Sometimes strange things just happen in the NFL.
DBs need to make plays in space. Clowney can’t help you there
Kamara is just a beast. No way around it. He’s going to eventually beat you somehow.
Reality bites
Terrible, terrible situational football from PC there. Take the f***ing TO,!
We had two… no idea what PC was thinking there.
Seattle is doing their absolute best to lose this game, even by their standards that was an infuriating first half.
I’m always AMAZED that so many college and NFL coaches STILL can’t get clock management right. I feel like I need to see a football shrink about this, I get so apoplectic about this.
This. And the big one that drives me crazy is making a multiple score game a multiple score game by kicking FGs that become moot.
It’s really unbelievable. I’m just a guy on a couch and I’m jumping up calling for a no-brainer timeout if you’re going to try to get in FG range there.
LOL. Exactly. Did the same thing. Made myself hot screaming at my tv to use one of those TO’s.
Honestly this is going to a great tell the truth monday.
Special teams coverage – check
Ball security – check
Tackling – check
Bad clock management – check
What a waste of a great play…
Absolutely mind boggling. You go into halftime with 2 timeouts in your pocket?
This game ain’t over yet. Not nearly.
Wow. Another huge penalty.
Unbelievable. And he even missed the FG to boot.
Good thing Seattle focused on their ST’s this past draft.
Can we draft a spl teams coach.. year and after year it’s the same story.
Sloppy…Sloppy…Sloppy
😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡!!!!!!!!!!!!
🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
My goodness. What is going on today? Another timeout burned to avoid 12 men on the field? Come on.
When that ball hit Pete in the face pre-game, did he get CTE?
This is sickening.
If I had to write a logical/realistic script for the Saints beating us at home this week, this would pretty much be it. I feel as if the game has hardly even started for us yet, and it’s halfway through the 3rd quarter. If we lose (likely now), you just have to write this one off and clean up the few mistakes that you made. Move on to next week.
-_-
Slopfest.
Well, maybe the offense can do something, but I have a feeling this game is over.
Holding on Ifedi again. What’s new?
Nice catch by Dissly, but man Russ has underthrown 3 guys on this drive.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!
This game is turning out to be horror show… offense is clearly in panic and missing plays.
That fumble from Carson changed the whole complexion of the game.
Can’t tackle Kamara
Hard enough to tackle on a normal day, but the rain is making it near impossible.
Enforcer aka BOOM is missing…
The important thing is for us fans not to get bent out of shape about this game. It’s just one of those “on any given Sunday” games. They happen.
This is true. Getting mollywhopped at home ain’t a good look though. The coaching has been jarringly bad as well.
Agree Paul, the nature of the (assumed) defeat can be, but we’ve performed poorly for 3 weeks now. Needs addressing.
I don’t think we’ve played nearly as bad as the score indicates. Kamara is a beast. He’s going to make teams look bad at times. You have to somewhat expect that. Two of their TD’s came from a punt return and a fumble return. They had two punts that they pinned inside the five that put our offense in the hole early. We just haven’t been allowed to get in sync.
Don’t disagree, Paul, but we can’t keep starting slowly giving up cheap points and chasing the game.
Just sad really…move on to next week.
There is no LOB defense to keep the game close and double digit upset is staring at us.
Offense, defense, Special teams and coaching are all sloppy.
Norton is terrible as DC. This is exactly what his D in Oakland looked like; Huuuge gaps in coverage, DB’s playing waaay off, and players indiscipline dans sloppy, with missed assigents and tackles galore.It was insanity on Carrols part to think we could hire the same guy, run the same stuff, and get a different result.
Prevent D only prevents YOU from winning. Carrol and Znorton must stop playing their DB’s so off…let those athletes compete!
And sideways passes didn’t work much when Bevell was OC, why keep running them now?
Apologies, my autocorrect is epic fail….
Never rule out Russ, but this is getting ugly.
Lose 23-30 with a onside kick
28-30 wtf do I know
Defense need to force a TO
Defense needs to start with tackling someone first…
That’s BAMF RW saying “I’m getting that ball into the end zone for my team if it kills me.”
At least Tony Romo remains entertaining.
Also Wilson pulling off his magic.
Good ole seahawk football.
Get down big early, end close as a nail biter. Read this book many times during the PC era.
I’ve had like 17 borderline heart attacks since PC took over XD
This wasn’t close. Carrol and his coaches just put on an absolute clinic on How To Make a Talented Team Less Than the Sum of it’s Parts…
They don’t trust this 2018 league leading rushing attack and rushing o line to get one yard??? Wha????????????????????????????
Pete loves to throw on 4th & a foot.
They are manhandled at the scrimmage on both sides..couldn’t trust anymore.
I’m confused.
Give the ball to Carson and live to see another down.
Well that was…interesting…in a bad way…
I was a little miffed as to why they ran Prosise up the middle in key short yardage situations. A small nitpick.
On to Arizona…I’m out!
Well deserved loss. Poor coaching, play execution, costly penalties and fumbles. They have been really sloppy since week #1 and it caught up to them today.
Imagine if Drew Brees had played today.
We would have won!
The Ziggy/Clowney pairing was pretty uninspiring today. Especially for being at home.
Clowney looks okay, but Ziggy has been invisible all game…
We abandoned the quick passing game that worked so well last week. Baffling decisions on offense and extremely poor tackling on defense. Poorly prepared team and poorly managed game today.
I’m very skeptical about our defense going forward based on all 3 games we’ve played so far.
The defense is so uninspiring. And now they have a giant question mark at RB.
KJ was fantastic and Shaq continues to play unheralded ball.
And if they continue to play Carson at RB than ya gotta start questioning Pete’s philosophy. Cardinal sin to turn it over in his offense.
He is been benched already … don’t think he started any drive after that. But someone has to leapfrog him in practice if that has to happen to start the game. But he will definitely be spelled when we are within our side of the field
No. You drafted a RB in the 1st round for presumably many reasons. One of those has popped up.
If Penny can’t go due to health reasons, you change the gameplan and get aggressive with your $50 million dollar, top tier QB.
Draft position does not mean anything in practice .. Penny need to earn it.
They were utilizing the quick passing game. And then everything that could go wrong, did, and they were playing catch up for most the second half.
Well…lots to clean up…2-1 isn’t terrible…but this team is a Wildcard team at best (barring some massive NFC West collapse). Use this season to build and solidify, add some juice in the upcoming draft, and compete in the next few seasons.
Yay…it’s a one score loss means one 4th down conversion could have won the game.
Not shooting yourself in the foot on any one of several occasions would have done it…
Yeah. I wish Russ had been able to hit Lockett in the endzone instead of overthrowing it. We were still in the game at that point.
Yes.. had we scored there we would not have gone for 4th down with in our 30.. 14 point swing right there.
Lockett for the TD, the refs missing holding on either Lockett or Turner on that last 4th and 1… it literally took a perfect storm of crap to lose to the Saints today, and we somehow managed.
Punt return for TD
Carson fumble for TD
Special teams penalty on missed FG.
That’s why the Seattle lost. Yeah, we can nit pick some of the play calls, etc. But the game was lost on those three plays.
It’s times like these that I feel sorry for Wilson. No chance of winning, but he fought till the very end…literally. Clean up fixable issues, get Penny healthy, and do ANYTHING to make the defense better…
– Not ready to give up Carson just yet. He didn’t fumble too many times last year and it may just be
either a fluke or something that can be corrected. I do think he needs new shoes though.
– Flukey game. I actually think we needed this kind of game for PC to make some serious points
to the team for them to take things seriously.
– I know Rob will have a great article with a sound and reasonable perspective on this game.
So much for Clowney and Ansah’s big impact I guess… 🤷♂️
Pretty immense game from Wilson.
Carson getting the fumbles is going to have big ramifications for the season. The defence looks less than ideal, sacks might be a bit inconsistent and overrated but zero is still not a good number. 2-1 is a start I’d have taken at the beginning of the year, but classic frustrating Seahawks.
Can anyone think of a another team that’s simultaneously played so consistently below its level of talent while never ever being out of a game? I know that’s 99% of the reason why Carroll wants to play like this, but Jesus
Ah well, we go again. Prosise didn’t break did he? I still remember that Pats game…
I disagree. Wilson is the highest paid player, yet he didn’t play up to it. When it was most needed, he failed–trying to bring us back, he threw pass after pass in the dirt, and missed a wide open TD to Lockett that would have made the game winnable, despite everything. Many QB’s in the league make that throw, but Wilson did not.
And on the fourth down at their own 28, Seattle calls all their WR’s to one side–the short side no less!–and yet doesn’t bother to even play-action to Carson in the backfield. To top off the mind-boggling lay bad play design, Wilson is so worried about a pick—a pick that would have actually been far more beneficial than the turnover on downs–that he throw an uncatchable ball! That was the Dipstick play of the week by Wilson for the entire NFL.
I’m sorry, but Wilson is the highest paid player in the NFL–he isn’t supposed to whiff on TD’s, be so often inaccurate with the game on the line, or make bonehead decisions like his throw to the stands on fourth down at his own 28!
You think this game is on Wilson?
Yeah… he couldn’t lead the Seahawks back from a three TD deficit with barely over a quarter to play. 🤦🏻♂️🙄
Good lord.
Mind-numbing that someone could put this game on RW. LOL Even on that missed throw to the end zone, he had a pass rush in his face when he released it. RW’s performance was one of the true positives in this game. He was put in the hole from the very beginning of the game by a punt return for a TD and terrible field position, and then kept getting put into a deeper hole by penalties, a drive killing fumble for a TD, a defense that couldn’t seem to key on and slow down Kamara when it mattered most, and finally by the clock. Hell, RW even played it gritty till the clock went to zero and there was no chance to win if for no other reason than to show that our team will not ever quit.
Anyway…mind-numbing…
No need to get hysterical over the slightest criticism of Wilson. I never said he was responsible for the loss–just that he failed to live up to his pay status. And now we hear it was he who audibles to a non-play-action pass on fourth down on his own 28, with all receivers on the short side of the field, then dramatically overthrew to his fifth-string WR when even a pick would be better than an incompletion! Mind numbing indeed! For 35 million, more is to be expected!
The game came down to tackling. Too many missed tackles, from some guys known to make the tackles. It was as if Kamara had Crisco on his jersey….
I thought the defense, overall, played pretty solid. They were in position multiple times to make plays, just didn’t execute perfectly. They also got put into several tough positions with short field position or explosive plays out of the RB position (see above tackling).
Not playing a clean game was the 2nd biggest problem. Too many preventable penalties. Not effort penalties, but lining up over the snapper on the missed kick by Saints… or a false start here and there.
The only minor quip I had wthl the offense was not getting the TE Dissly into the mix earlier in the game. Once they got him involved, everything seems to open up for Lockett and DK… there were windows (holes) in the Saints defense.
Perfect summary here by Duane:
☝️
Yep……Is this because of coaching that these mistakes happen?
Yes, many of the mistakes I saw were due to players being put in bad situations–Kendrick’s or Wright trying to cover WR’s–or a lack of discipline; guys panicking because the playcall left gaps, trying and overcompensating by trying to do their neighbors job. And that’s directly the fault of the coaching. Wilson only able to audible to a non-play action pass on fourth down?! That is also as much a coaching problem as a bonehead decision by Wilson.
Yet there were plenty of mistakes by players…
Tedric Thompson nearly at the middle of the field after the turnover that resulted in a huge penalty?! Lack of discipline, fault; half coaching. You think that shit happens in NE?! But that idiocy by Thompson is also his own fault, and as dumb or tires than the penalty that finally soured Carrol on Thomas Rawls. It was inexcusable!
Well no wonder why Laviska Shenault had a quiet game – he went down with an injury on Colorado’s first possession. Speculation is he got a concussion.
I didn’t see that.