Jaxon Smith-Njigba is having a breakout season and nobody knows it
Seahawks NFL Pro stats through 4 weeks, plus Lions shutdown Seahawks passing game with man coverage: Seaside Joe 2040
According to Next Gen Stats, Geno Smith entered Week 4’s game with a 73.5% completion percentage against man coverage, second-best in the NFL to that point behind C.J. Stroud. However, the Lions have played the second-highest rate of man coverage in the NFL and apparently they do it quite well because Geno was thriving against zone on Monday night but only completing 40% of his passes for under 5 Y/A against man:
“Geno Smith was at his best against the Lions in zone coverage, finishing 30 of 36 for 302 yards against zone compared to 8 of 20 for 93 yards (TD & INT) against man coverage. Against zone, Smith’s average target separation was 4.3 yards (11.1% tight window); against man, Smith averaged 2.5 yards of separation per target (30.0% tight window).”
These are other stats I’ve researched and compiled for you from Next Gen Stats about the Seattle Seahawks, both from Week 4’s loss to the Lions and the 2024 season as a whole. I found quite a few surprises and notable revelations that could lead us down a path to figure out how the Seahawks can be better in Week 5 and 2025.
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Passing
QB Geno Smith - His OL actually wasn’t that bad
Through four games, can you guess which Geno start has by far his highest single game EPA of this season?
Don’t cheat, but I’ll post the answer in a few paragraphs so that you can see if you got it right.
As you can see from Geno’s passing chart this week, Ryan Grubb didn’t favor any single area or side of the field and that worked out well for Seattle when Detroit wasn’t in man coverage. It didn’t work out on Geno’s final and longest throw of the night though, the only pass beyond 20 yards:
Despite 62 dropbacks (!!), the Lions only pressured Geno 29% of the time, the lowest rate allowed by the Seahawks this season. Is it fair to say that Seattle’s offensive line actually didn’t do that poorly against Aidan Hutchinson given the circumstances? Though Hutchinson had a season-best 10 pressures, he also had a ridiculous 54 pass rushing snaps (most by an NFL player in one game this season); he had a higher rate of pressures in Week 2 against the Bucs. And consider this: Huchinson didn’t have any tackles or run stops, the first time this year he was held under 5 tackles or 3 run stops.
What else can we say about Geno? Let’s take a look at some more passing stats, as well as why Jaxon Smith-Njigba could be Seattle’s best receiver (by far), Tyler Lockett’s decline in separation, Kenneth Walker’s elusiveness, DK Metcalf’s deep target rate, plus the standouts on defense, including a unique stat about Devon Witherspoon and Riq Woolen’s elite coverage stat: