Geno Smith's "gold" opportunity in Week 1
Your answers to this week's Seahawks fan survey: Seaside Joe 1540
Last week, I posted a handful of questions in response to some betting odds on the NFL and the Seattle Seahawks and fans showed up in droves to give their expectations as answers. As always, you can never be “wrong” when you answer questions on your own feelings and expectations, there is no right answer. This is just how a percentage of Seahawks fans are feeling about the upcoming season and unsurprisingly, most of you feel that Seattle is at least as good as they were in 2022, if not better.
The over/under on the Seahawks 2023 win total is currently set at 8.5 and I think that’s one of the strongest “over” bets in the league, although the odds don’t pay out all that great because to me it seems so obvious.
It’s not unsurprising to me because I think you’re biased (we did do a very popular survey about that last year) but because the Seattle Seahawks do seem improved after going 9-8 in 2022. Especially considering that the team played so poorly after their Week 9 win over the Arizona Cardinals and starting with their loss to the Bucs in Germany when they were beaten so mercilessly on the ground.
Over the final eight games, the Seahawks ranked 17th in points scored, 19th in points allowed, and 20th in points differential with their only wins coming against the John Wolford Rams, the Mike White Jets, and the Baker Mayfield Rams. And facing Brock Purdy’s 49ers in the wild card round, Seattle’s -27.60 Expected Points Added allowed was by far their worst mark out of 18 games.
But that’s bad news from last season, which is over.
The Seahawks defensive line gets almost a total reset, the inside linebackers unit is overhauled, and Seattle has a highly-rated first round pick for each side of the football.
It’s been seven years since the Seahawks beat the crap out of the Los Angeles Rams when John Fassel was the interim head coach in place of Jeff Fisher, a 24-3 victory on Thursday Night Football in 2016, but Week 1 would seem to be the best opportunity for Seattle to make a Sean McVay football team feel bad about themselves.
We could have said something similar in Week 18, when the Rams were down to their 14th or so offensive line combination, Mayfield starting just five weeks after he was added to the team on waivers, and playing without Cooper Kupp or Aaron Donald. It still took the Seahawks going into overtime and Quandre Diggs making a play in front of Bobby Wagner for Seattle to win by three.
Now Seattle is back to needing Wagner to make plays in front of Diggs.
Despite continued struggles against the Rams last season, the two teams are going to be much different. L.A. has not added a single player of note in the offseason (the closest being third-string tight end Hunter Long), but they’ve parted with Wagner, Jalen Ramsey, Leonard Floyd, Allen Robinson, A’Shawn Robinson, Greg Gaines, Taylor Rapp, and Matt Gay, among others. The two teams are quite intentionally going in opposite directions this offseason and I will not be surprised if the Rams try to move Matthew Stafford, Kupp, and/or Donald at some point this year.
However, 77-percent of Seaside Joe readers still think that the 5.5-point spread in Week 1 is not insulting because “The Rams are always a problem” and I would have to agree.
The Rams have always been a problem since hiring McVay. Even when they shouldn’t be.
But I will say two things about that: a) We might be thinking of the Rams in an even worse light by the end of training camp if they make additional trades and b) If the Seahawks want to be taken seriously as NFC contenders next season then it is their duty to beat teams like L.A. by more than 10 points.
The Rams are almost unanimously projected to have the worst defense in the NFL and potentially also the worst offensive line, in addition to not having any weapons for Stafford apart from Kupp and rebuilding literally their entire special teams unit.
“Oh, you just mean they got a new kicker or something.”
No, I mean they have undrafted rookie kickers, a rookie punter, a rookie longsnapper, rookies competing to be the returners, probably an entirely new coverage unit, and a first-time special teams coordinator. They are cutting corners like Fyre Fest.
(I think enough time has passed for “Fyre Fest” to be a funny reference again.)
So yeah, do I think the Seahawks could struggle against the Rams? Of course. Do I think Geno Smith and Seattle’s offense needs to come out firing and scoring high numbers against a defense that will be horrendous—if the Seahawks are actually one of the best teams in the NFC? They have to do that, it’s not even a question.
The same can be said for how Russell Wilson looks in his first season with Sean Payton has the head coach of the Denver Broncos and 76% of you voted that Geno still has better MVP odds.
Wilson and Geno have the same MVP odds right now. Wilson has a new coach and a very good supporting cast, but Geno’s got his own advantages and maybe none bigger than the opportunity to win four games against the Rams and Cardinals next season. That’s just the reality in leaving the NFC West for the AFC West.
If the Seahawks and Broncos switched conferences, it would be interesting to see how the expectations changed for either fanbase and the media’s outside observations. The final five poll questions were all basically about expectations of division winners, conference winners, and Seattle’s Super Bowl odds.
The Cowboys had the most votes as being “the biggest threat in the NFC” out of only these eight teams:
I didn’t include the Eagles, 49ers, or Seahawks because I felt that would be too obvious. I think that these four teams mentioned are going to be reasonably bundled with Seattle in terms of being “contenders” but it seems like Dallas has picked up a lot of steam. It’s been almost 30 years since the Cowboys made it past the divisional round of the playoffs, so I’ll be skeptical until I see it happen with my own eyes. Same goes for the Lions.
In the AFC, I picked these five teams and the Jets just barely edged out the Ravens.
But otherwise, it was a fairly close vote for all five teams.
It just goes to show how difficult the AFC is because you’ve got the Chargers about eighth in the conference and what weaknesses do they have? If the Chargers were in the NFC South, they might win 14 or 15 games.
It’s certainly been helpful for Seattle’s expectations to have moved to the NFC over 20 years ago and to still be there as the conference has struggled to find many quarterbacks and head coaches of note. The Seahawks have the 13th-best Super Bowl odds and there was a tie between “That’s fair” and “It’s only a little low-ball” at 34% each.
Only 23% of you voted that it was a major low-ball and that the Seahawks were at least as good as Dallas, the team with the third-best odds in the conference.
These were the four teams favored to win their division and while 31% said that the Jaguars were the “wrong” pick in the AFC South (I can only imagine that’s because of the Titans), 44% said that these would be the four winners.
But I think everyone can agree that there’s at least one strong contender to compete with in the AFC North and the AFC East, if not the AFC West with the Chargers. The Jets might only be the 10th-best team in the AFC and they also might be good enough to earn the number one seed.
In the NFC, 43% don’t think the Saints will win the NFC South. It could be the Falcons, it could be the Panthers with Bryce Young, and notably it seems like the Bucs—winners of the 2020 Super Bowl and the division last year—are the team in the division who nobody is interested in anymore without Tom Brady.
Could the Seahawks win the NFC West? I certainly don’t think you were voting against the 49ers because you expected it to be the Rams or Cards.
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The Cowboys won't go to the SB until Jerry Jones fires GM Jerry Jones and head coach Jerry Jones and sticks to signing the checks!
I have been commenting now for years that we need the new players with energy, determination, and strong healthy bodies, as well as the veterans who have seen it all before; last year encouraged me and this year I see increased hope and success for the Hawks