Daily Archives: September 18, 2016

Week 2: At Los Angeles

This offense looks as bad as the 2011 crew

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at-los-angeles-logoPete Carroll said last week that his team was ahead of where it was at this time last year. He’s probably rethinking that opinion after the Seahawks scored just three points in yet another loss to the Rams on Sunday.

While the defense is playing to the right standard, giving up just 19 points in the first two games, the offense has reverted to 2011 levels. That’s right: Russell Wilson and company are actually worse than they were early last season, scoring as poorly as the pre-Wilson 2011 unit, which was led by Tarvaris Jackson and Charlie Whitehurst.

The Seahawks have scored 15 points in two games. The last time they had two-game stretches that bad was in 2011, when they scored 13 total in a split with the Steelers (24-0 loss) and Cardinals (13-10 win) and then 15 in losses to the Browns (6-3) and Bengals (34-12).

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State of the team, Week 2: At Los Angeles

O-line on Plan C as Hawks face Rams’ stud D-line

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“The best-laid plans of mice and men (oft go astray)” — Robert Burns, “To a Mouse”

at-los-angeles-logoAfter getting pushed around by the great defensive fronts of the Rams, Panthers and Vikings last season, the Seahawks knew they needed to beef up their offensive line if they were going to win the NFC this year.

So they signed 6-foot-7, 331-pound J’Marcus Webb and 6-7, 309-pound Bradley Sowell and then drafted 6-6, 324-pound Germain Ifedi, 6-4, 314-pound Rees Odhiambo and 6-2, 299-pound center Joey Hunt.

The original plan was to pair Ifedi and Webb on the right side to, as Pete Carroll put it, “get as big as you can get in football.” That, along with moving Justin Britt (6-6, 315) to center, was their strategy for dealing with the great defensive fronts they were set to face in 2016 — the Rams, Panthers, Dolphins, Jets, et al.

But, Robert Burns’ poetic proverb has proven true for the Hawks, who are on to Plan C — and possibly D — as they take their first crack at Aaron Donald, Robert Quinn, Michael Brockers and the rest of the Rams’ deep line.

Continue reading O-line on Plan C as Hawks face Rams’ stud D-line →