Brady Russell era is underway

Seahawks place Robbie Ouzts on IR, sign D'Anthony Bell

The Seahawks will play at least four games without superstar phenom fullback Robbie Ouzts, as the team placed him on IR this week with an ankle injury. Seattle, the only team in the NFL with two fullbacks (and only 10 teams even have one), turns to Brady Russell against the Arizona Cardinals on Thursday night. Klint Kubiak believes Russell is ready for the challenge:

"Number one, he's a phenomenal teammate and a guy that we have a lot of confidence in that has already been a phenomenal player on (special) teams," offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak said of Russell, who converted to fullback from tight end this offseason. "He had a really great offseason with us as an offense so looking forward to getting him on the field this week."

Keeping Russell at final cuts was a bit of a surprise given the surplus of tight ends and fullbacks on the roster, but nobody let go was a huge loss. Russell not only has the most special teams snaps on the Seahawks, he has a massive lead over second place Drake Thomas: 72 snaps to 55 snaps.

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Ouzts has been a regular on offense, playing in 34.5% of the snaps so far, which is a higher percentage of snaps than Pro Bowler Kyle Juszczyk of the 49ers (32.5%) is essentially tied for the highest mark in the NFL with Dolphins fullback Alec Ingold.

It would be surprising if Kubiak significantly dialed back fullback useage with Russell in the lineup for the next four weeks. It’s time for Brady Russell to show off what he’s learned from switching positions this offseason; Russell only has 56 career offensive snaps, including seven this season.

Ouzts played more snaps in three games than Russell has played going into his third season.

Another player benefiting from Ouzts stint on IR is safety and punt-blocker D’Anthony Bell. The Seahawks signed Bell to the 53-man roster on Wednesday and replaced him on the practice squad with safety Jerrick Reed II, who was waived on Tuesday. Bell is useful on special teams, but we also haven’t been given any assurances yet that Nick Emmanwori and/or Julian Love will return against the Cardinals.

Both were called “limited” this week, but these are just walkthroughs and estimations on how much they would have practiced if there was a practice. Devon Witherspoon, Boye Mafe, Jalen Sundell, Leonard Williams were also given the limited tags, while Zach Charbonnet looks ready to return.

Update: The Seahawks listed Charbonnet as questionable.

If you find any of this news upsetting, here have some Grey Zabel footage posted this week by Saturday Morning Inspection.

More All-22 breakdowns

Josh Jobe:

Sam Darnold/Klint Kubiak:

Tory Horton:

What’s something you learned from any of these videos, if you watched them and want to share?

Sam Darnold footage from Wil Upton:

A good season by Darnold will go a long way towards putting the Seahawks in position to win the division, starting with Thursday’s game against the Cardinals and not falling to 0-2 in the NFC West.

More Super Joes questions/comments

There were a couple more added yesterday after I posted my answers, which you can read here if you missed it. Upgrade to Super Joes for $10 per month if you want to help support the newsletter a little bit more and you think what the heck i can do it:

JohnnyLondon: We are currently no.1 in DVOA. This used to be touted as quite a badge of honour back in the day; but now that FO is no more and most of it is hidden behind FTN’s paywall, should we still allow ourselves a puff-chested happy little jig about this, or has DVOA lost its glamour as a statistical construct of a team’s efficiency?

I did used to feel like a bit of a “DVOA guy” who would post weekly DVOA updates and put a lot of stock into it. There’s absolutely no question that for better or worse, “footballoutsiders” did themselves no favors in terms of popularity of use by going behind a paywall. Now, who am I to criticize a paywall? Not me. I would never.

Does it change how often people cite DVOA? 100%. That’s impossible to avoid. The best ability for a stat is availability.

But do I have an FTN membership? Yes. Hit me up any time you want to know the DVOA.

DVOA updates week 3:

• Seahawks offensive DVOA, 12.6% overall (6th)

• Colts are in first place at 32.6%

• Seahawks, 4th in passing DVOA

• Seahawks, 18th in rushing DVOA

• Seahawks defensive DVOA, -17% (5th)

• 6th in passing defense DVOA

• 3rd in rushing defense DVOA

I think the Colts appear to be the best team in DVOA right now but Seattle has little weakness aside from rushing offense. Frankly, the whole site is much harder to use and understand now.

Scott M: Is there any website that has information on "hidden yards"? IE, does someone publish stats for both individuals and/or teams yards won/lost by penalties and any other theoretical gains or losses which are not accounted for.

For instance, if a RB rattles off a 20-yard run but it's brought back because of a holding call, we only record the minus ten yards due to the penalty, but in a way through a certain lense, we can also say we lost those 20 yards. Sorry for the long ramble...keep up the good work. It's about to get fun I think!

I’ve never heard of such a site, no. Anybody else?

Scott M: Another one...You said previously that we needed to hit on certain signings, what is your impression so far on those players?

I guess we could say that GMs need time to prove themselves just like players and coaches do. John Schneider’s first free agency without Pete Carroll was a huge swing and miss (not that PC’s free agency was always great) and I have no problem bringing that up.

First impressions of the 2025 free agency class are completely reversed from 2024:

• Sam Darnold, I haven’t seen any of these “he’s so bad under pressure or when you get him outside of the pocket” concerns yet

• Cooper Kupp, I was never expecting 1,000 yards, he’s giving Seattle more than what I expected

• DeMarcus Lawrence, his presence could be a major reason for Seattle’s top-3 run defense

• Eric Saubert, he’s a blocking TE3 and a special teams asset for $1.2 million

• D’Anthony Bell, his blocked punt has paid for itself

Marquez Valdes-Scantling is the only miss I see. Josh Jones is injured and hasn’t done much, but not really even worth talking about him. Drew Lock is a perfectly good backup quarterback. And then there are the late pickups…

Derion Kendrick and Chazz Surratt are above and beyond expectations. Maybe they end up being short-lived Seahawks, maybe long-term, but it’s impressive enough that we’re even talking about them already for good reasons.

Bret: I don't know if i'm too late in getting in this comment, but I wanted to ask you if you thought that my hope for the season has thus far come true. In a previous comment to one of your posts, I said my hope for the season was that byron murphy would become the game wrecker that I believed he could be. You're much more analytical and have more time to devote to this type of investigation and analysis, so I wonder whether I am out to lunch when I express my belief that he has been wrecking games? My belief is that leonard williams is actually drawing enough attention that helps pave the way for murphy's dominance. Daniel jeremiah said as much, and I feel like maybe I sound like a copycat, but leonard williams is just sick.

I would enjoy your perspective on byron murphy's performance thus far, and where it fits in with your conception of the label "game wrecker."

I don’t enough time to devote a full answer to this today unfortunately, but I would say that yes, you are correct. And no you are not out to lunch? If I read that expression correctly.

Game-wrecker Byron Murphy has played in 145 snaps and has a pressure rate of 15.5%. That’s 13 pressures and 2.5 sacks on 84 pass rushing snaps.

At a benchmark of 60 pass rushing snaps, that’s the ninth-best QB pressure rate in the NFL overall and the best by a defensive tackle. A lot of people expected the Falcons to draft Murphy last year and instead they took Michael Penix. A lot of people expected the Seahawks to pick Penix and they got Murphy.

Far be it from me to say that the winner of the draft is in the books yet, but I know which of those players I’m taking right now.

Seaside Joe 2396