7 thoughts: Seahawks-Giants

What happened in Week 5 and how will it impact the Seahawks in Week 6? Seaside Joe 2044

Going into the week, there was a universally-held belief that the Seattle Seahawks are a better team than the New York Giants. Actually, I don’t imagine that anyone was ranking the Giants higher than the Seahawks on any list other than the “Haplessness Hierarchy”.

Most people probably still think the Seahawks are better than the Giants. But the race is certainly much closer after Seattle’s 29-20 loss at home and if you thought the Seahawks biggest problem on defense was just “the national media disrespecting them”, you were wrong. 

1. The Seahawks misused funds

The Seahawks are 32nd in offensive line spending at $23 million this season, including $5.8 million for Charles Cross (rookie contract), $3.4 million for George Fant (IR), $3.3 million for Connor Williams (late signing), $1.4 million for Abe Lucas (IR), $1.2 million for Laken Tomlinson, $1.1 million for Anthony Bradford, $1.1 million for Stone Forsythe, and $1 million for Christian Haynes.

This exact same team decided that Noah Fant should get a two-year, $21 million contract with $11.5 million guaranteed, which means he counts $7.5 million against the 2024 salary cap.

That means that the Seahawks decided that they should pay Fant $7.5 million and they should pay the entire interior of the offensive line, including four players, should be paid $7.6 million. And almost half of that went to Williams because Seattle’s center competition was so underwhelming that John Schneider only felt compelled to sign a veteran center because he was an obscene bargain left on the market.

I know we can get really cute with this and talk about all the other players getting paid whatever-whatever, but that’s not necessary and it undermines a better point, which is that the Seahawks paid Noah Fant $11.5 million! That’s almost half of the combined cost of EVERY OFFENSIVE LINEMAN ON THE ROSTER.

If you think that this revelation will change Seattle’s long-standing history of not paying offensive linemen…why?

The Seahawks will probably be forced to extend Cross because he was a top-10 pick and maybe Williams, so the price of two players will go up, but I don’t expect Schneider to change Seattle’s longstanding strategy to use day two/day three players at guard. That’s assuming the team will even extend Williams (if they even should), in which case I’d expect the Seahawks to continue to be cheap at center also.

2. Seahawks definitely have a cornerback problem

Not exactly sure yet how Devon Witherspoon played after last week’s underwhelming performance, but there was a lot of focus on Tre Brown “getting pick on” by Daniel Jones…Rare is the day that Daniel Jones can bully anyone…

We will find out what Brown’s final stats look like in a day or two, I certainly don’t think they will be good. Riq Woolen left the game with an ankle injury and Mike Macdonald’s post-game comments, while not very illuminating, didn’t sound optimistic. Nehemiah Pritchett stepped in and did get a key pass defense, however Macdonald said that’s something that Seattle’s corners would need to “compete” for as far as replacing Woolen. On a short week, it seems that Witherspoon, Brown, and Pritchett could start against the 49ers.

3. You’re the only Chenna see

Blink and you missed it. Uchenna Nwosu played for the first time in 50 weeks, then was ruled out before halftime with a thigh injury. By the end of the game, Derick Hall was also out with a foot injury. The Seahawks will need Boye Mafe’s return on Thursday. Hall had a sack, but it wasn’t really a sack; Jones tripped on his own tackle. I think that’s two sacks for Hall this season that he kind of walked into, but I could be miscounting. I’ll take them all.

4. Ryan Grubb under fire

I understand that the offense has had to overcome fumbles by DK Metcalf that led to a touchdown in back-to-back games, and that re-dictates the pace and style of offense Grubb can call, but these last two efforts are not acceptable. This isn’t UW. You have to prove you can run the football effectively.

Kenneth Walker—quite possibly Seattle’s best offensive player—had five carries for 19 yards. Zach Charbonnet had 2 for 11.

The Seahawks had 56 pass attempts and 14 carries by running backs in Week 4’s loss to the Lions.

The Seahawks had 40 pass attempts and 7 carries by running backs in Week 5’s loss to the Giants.

I like to think I’m the last person to point fingers at the coordinators before talking about the players (and I’d still do that in this case) but these numbers—113 dropbacks by Geno Smith, 21 carries by running backs in the last two games—are not going to cut it.

5. Mike Macdonald under fire

I am all in favor of the direction the Seahawks took this year, I support what Macdonald’s been doing, and I’m not panicking or encouraging panic. I am writing this down multiple times so that it’s very clear that this section is titled “Macdonald under fire” because there’s definitely a slight narrative perculating OUT THERE (not right here) that Macdonald’s defense was “exposed” recently.

I made a joke that Pete Carroll could have had the Seahawks 3-2 with a bad defense and an inconsistent offense—and that’s all it was, I still like where Seattle should be headed with Macdonald and Grubb. Do I stand by the joke that “Pete could have done this”? Of course. I’m not turning on the Seahawks coaching staff.

But the Seahawks just got obliterated by Daniel Jones, Darius Slayton, and Tyrone Tracy, six days after they let the Lions complete all 19 passing attempts.

The Seahawks didn’t play perfect defense in the first three weeks of the season, but they got near-perfect results because Seattle’s opponents didn’t appear to be formidable. Now the Seahawks play another opponent that most assumed couldn’t even score in practice and Macdonald’s defense was essentially annihilated by Brian Daboll.

Tracy has the most rushing yards (129) of any player in Week 5 and he did that on 18 carries. He had 47 rushing yards over expectation.

Slayton had eight catches for 122 yards and six first downs. He had 58 receiving yards over expected and averaged 11 air yards per target, so not exactly the dink and dunk danny offense we expected. The Seahawks were getting hosed by all angles against the Giants and if it were not for a fraction of an inch that led to a 100-yard touchdown, Seattle probably would have lost this game by multiple touchdowns.

So as a defensive coordinator, Macdonald has to look in the mirror and assess why his defense has not been acceptable over the last two weeks—especially because we think the best offenses Seattle will face are in their future, not their past. But he also has to look at himself as the head coach: The Seahawks have had back-to-back embarrassing days on defense. First Goff was perfect (not to mention a porous run defense) en route to the worst EPA by a Seahawk defense since 2010 and second the Giants just treated Seattle like they were…the Giants.

We have to be able to criticize the Seahawks—coaches and players—without being censored for it. I am all in favor of what the Seahawks are doing (save a few items that I believe are well-covered territory), I support the coaches and Mike Macdonald, and I’m not panicking over these last two games. The criticism coming from our end should be no different than the internal criticism I expect from Schneider, Macdonald, Grubb, Geno Smith, and so on. The whole team has to assess what they’ve been doing wrong in these five games—and yes, especially the last two—in order to have fewer things to criticize in the future.

6. The DK Metcalf question nobody wants to address

I include myself in “nobody”! There isn’t an easy answer to the problem that DK presents to the Seahawks: Is it riskier to trade him…or to keep him?

If you try to bring up parting with DK after he scores a touchdown, forget about it. Not going to be allowed. However, DK leads all receivers in fumbles since 2019, including his eighth LOST fumble on Sunday. He leads all receivers in penalties since 2019. And I’d say that in about half of the games, he makes no discernible impact. Personally, I don’t think that Jake Bobo could replace Metcalf as the X (although I know some people do). However, do I think the Seahawks might survive with Bobo—and have fewer costly mistakes?

First the Seahawks must answer if they can move foward with DK. Then the Seahawks must decide if they want to pay DK’s next contract. Then the Seahawks must decide what they can get for DK in a trade. There appear to be an inordinate number of receiver-needy teams, and I think most of them would be more comfortable with DK than with Davante Adams due to their age difference, but are the Bills going to give up a first round pick for a receiver who played his way out of Seattle?

It may be a moot point because Metcalf is going to play this Thursday against the 49ers. If he has a good game, most will have moved on from these five games, all of which had at least one significant DK Metcalf mistake.

It’s a huge risk to part with a rare player like Metcalf. Would the Seahawks be 5-0 without Metcalf? Would the Seahawks be 0-5 without Metcalf?

It’s such a tough, tough question to answer. But if the Seahawks decide to keep Metcalf long-term, they must accept that these errors will continue. And if they can’t accept that, they must consider putting Metcalf on the trade block.

7. Seahawks linebacker issue

I’ll give a hat-tip here to Randall Murray in the SSJ live game chat for pointing out the linebacker misreads and poor tackling around the line of scrimmage when they happened. On one hand, Jerome Baker had an unbelievable first series by stuffing the Giants on third-and-Goal from the 1, then helping force the fumble on fourth down that led to Rayshawn Jenkins’ 100-yard touchdown return.

Baker led the team with 14 tackles, had a sack, and forced that fumble (although it seemed to me like the ball was working itself out without needing help). As to whether or not Baker actually had a good game for four quarters, or to what degree we should cut him some slack given that this was almost like his first preseason game, is up in the air. Whether it’s Baker or Dodson or the safeties, Seattle’s defense had little to be proud of by the end of the game.

Tyrice Knight missed this game and was dealing with a “personal issue” that caused him to miss practices. Will Macdonald be using Knight more moving forward in place of Dodson and/or Baker? It’s early in the season and there have been a lot of injuries, so that might happen regardless of whether it’s the right thing to do.

I am a big fan of reading comments in the Seaside Joe live chat. It helps me follow the game from additional angles and getting alternative non-Twitter based opinions that I might miss or not even understand without the help of the community here.

Hot - S Rayshawn Jenkins

I’m legitimately not sure if Jenkins had an all-around good game, but if you return a fumble 100 yards for a touchdown—MORE TOUCHDOWNS THAN THE OFFENSE HAD FOR 58 MINUTES—you get an award from me.

Medium - QB Geno Smith

This offense does feel like a repeat of 2022 and 2023, in that the Seahawks can have one or two great drives, but disappear for quarters at a time. I mean, DISAPPEAR. Seattle’s offense had 6 points prior to Geno’s touchdown pass to JSN with 2:13 left.

It was certainly a “good enough” game for Geno, I can’t say he was the downfall of the offense by any means or the reason that the Seahawks lost. But sometimes when you’re talking about “Is this guy going to carry his team on a bad day?” like you might get with only a handful of quarterbacks—I’m not saying it’s expected all the time—the offense still stalled out over and over and over again until the final minutes.

Then again on the last drive, resulting in the blocked field goal. It’s amazing that Seattle almost tied it, but surely we all agree that the Seahawks should not have let that drive end in a field goal attempt.

If at the end of the year we line up all of Geno’s starts this season, this one’s going to land somewhere in the middle.

Mild - Coaches

There’s plenty of blame to go around to players, but did Brian Daboll really just out-coach somebody? That’s frightening!