Insights in the guards 'n of good and eval
Offensive line rankings misrepresent how much better the Seahawks will be upfront
I’m not saying that the Seahawks deserve the benefit of the doubt when it comes to expectations of their offensive line, but writers at least owe fans an accurate representation of who they are now when ranking Seattle’s front-five going into twentytwenty-five. The early indications just before training camp are predictably bad signs — PFF ranked the Seahawks OL 30th, while ProFootballNetwork has now ranked them 31st — but I’m going in the opposite direction and expecting Seattle’s blocking to be significantly improved.
One of us will be wrong, either them or Seaside Joe. But fans deserve a fair picture of where the Seahawks ARE, not a recap of where they WERE. As is usually the case though, “prediction” type articles are too focused on the past and not the present.
I’ll now lay out some points in PFN’s rankings that grossly misrepresent how much Seattle’s offensive line personnel and coaching has changed since the end of last season.
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WHAT PFN SAID
ProFootballNetworked ranked the Seahawks offensive line 31st going into the 2025 season.
2024 PFSN OL+ Grade: 57.7 (F)
The struggles of this unit were undoubtedly a significant factor in Ryan Grubb’s dismissal following his inaugural season as offensive coordinator.
As I alluded to earlier, why are we talking so much about the past in rankings meant to represent the present? Seattle’s 2024 offensive coordinator got more mentions (1) than current offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak (0).
If the point is to bring up part of why the Seahawks offensive line played so poorly in 2024, which could be that Grubb was out of his element as an NFL coordinator and unable to fit the right plays to those players, then say that. This implies that the offensive line got Grubb fired when in actuality neither side was good for the other.
Tru Media Sports recently released each team's percentage of passing plays in 2024 that were five-man protections, meaning no extra blockers. The Seahawks confusingly placed ninth, with 74.18% of their passing plays occurring with five-man empty protections. No wonder Smith was under constant duress.
Just look at some of the teams who placed ahead of the Seahawks. The Green Bay Packers, Buffalo Bills, Cleveland Browns, and Dallas Cowboys have some of the best offensive lines in the NFL. Grubb and the Seahawks had no business running five-man protections.
Offensive coordinators are SIGNIFICANTLY responsible for the performance of the offensive line. Look at past examples like the Denver Broncos offenses of the mid-90s, or recent examples like the Eagles and Lions.
Although the Eagles and Lions have massively talented players on the offensive line, their coordinators also called plays that maximized their abilities in wildly visible ways: Kellen Moore and Ben Johnson are now head coaches because of it.
How can PFN write an article about CURRENT offensive line rankings and not mention that Klint Kubiak — who is anything but an “unknown” given his previous experiences as an OC and his family lineage — represents a monumental shift in offensive philosophy and play calling? That right there is how a reader knows within the first two lines of an article that something is clearly amiss.
Kubiak’s 2024 season narrative is one of injuries as tackles Trevor Penning and Taliese Fuaga were the only two players on the entire offense to play in more than 75% of the snaps and only three others played in more than 60%.
But the other part of his story with the Saints is that New Orleans had the most dominant offense in the league over the first two games: 93 points, 800 yards of offense, 370 rushing yards. What do you think people were highlighting about the Saints when the offense opened that dominantly? They focused on the offensive line of course.
It starts with the offensive line (Erik McCoy, Cesar Ruiz, Trevor Penning, Taliese Fuaga, Lucas Patrick), particularly the run blocking that has been dominant, but it’s the overall coordination within Kubiak’s offense that has changed everything.
In Week 3, the Saints immediately lost starting Pro Bowl center Erik McCoy to an injury the cost him all but three games for the rest of the year.
During Kubiak’s only other season as an offensive coordinator, 2021 with the Minnesota Vikings, his team was league average in both passing and rushing (and the fewest turnovers in the NFL) despite an offensive line with an average age of 24.2 and a rookie left tackle. Right tackle Brian O’Neill made his first Pro Bowl.
If you’re writing about the Seahawks offensive line in 2025, you don’t have to say one-third as much about Kubiak as I did. But mentioning his name, his experience, and his scheme would be a good start. Hell, I’ll lower the bar to: MENTION THAT HE EXISTS.
BACK TO WHAT PFN WROTE:
Throughout last season, Seattle surrendered a 39.4% pressure rate (30th) and an 8.3% sack rate (24th). The unit faltered regardless of whether opposing defenses sent additional pass rushers or played it conservatively, with their overall metrics falling well short of expectations despite considerable organizational investment in the line over recent years.
Sacks are a quarterback stat. Strangely enough, Geno Smith and Sam Darnold have the exact same career sack rate (7.72%), but I would at least mention mention quarterbacks if I’m mentioning sack rate as it relates to the offensive line.
This article has now absolved Grubb (apparently a victim of the offensive line) and ignored Smith’s part in holding the ball for too long. Which, most likely, Darnold is going to do too. But Smith’s sack rate was only a hair better when he had Abe Lucas during his breakout 2022 season because sack rates tend to follow quarterbacks everywhere they go.
Their ground game protection proved even more problematic.
Seattle finished third-from-last in RBYBC/rush (0.66) and 28th in RBWR. Given these concerning statistics, their inability to maintain momentum during crucial stretches of the playoff race and their eventual elimination in Week 17 becomes far more understandable.
If we mention Grubb, we have to mention an offense that was 29th in rushing attempts and that was an improvement after Seattle had the fewest attempts in the NFL at the midpoint of the season — despite the Seahawks being the only team in the bottom-10 of that stat to not have a losing record.
Of course we can ding the Seahawks for run blocking, but it’s imperative to state that they also didn’t try very often.
In the final eight games of the season, when Seattle posted a 6-2 record, the Seahawks ranked 13th in rushing yards per carry (4.4) and yet they were still only 26th in rushing attempts.
This timing coincides with changes at center and right tackle— there wasn’t a single mention of Connor Williams (56% of the snaps before he retired) or the problems at right tackle in the entire article — which implies that the Seahawks may have been trending upwards when Olu Oluwatimi and Abe Lucas were inserted into the starting lineup in Week 11’s win over the San Francisco 49ers.
But aside from mentioning that the Seahawks drafted Grey Zabel to replace Laken Tomlinson, personnel changes were ignored by PFN. They also wrote this ridiculously misleading sentence:
This selection represents just the second time in the past decade that Seattle has invested their first-round selection in an offensive lineman.
After picking Germain Ifedi in 2016, it’s true that the Seahawks didn’t draft a first round offensive linemen between 2017 and 2021. They also didn’t have/use a first round pick in two of those five years. We’re basically criticizing the Seahawks for going three years in a row without drafting a first round offensive lineman, something that happens to most teams.
But THE SEAHAWKS HAVE DRAFTED A FIRST ROUND OFFENSIVE LINEMAN IN TWO OF THE PAST FOUR YEARS!
Charles Cross was a top-10 PICK!
Then the Seahawks doubled-down in the third round with ABE LUCAS!
Grey Zabel is one of the highest-drafted guards of the CENTURY!
Christian Haynes was Seattle’s SECOND PICK last year!
The misleading sentence implies that the Seahawks have consistently ignored the offensive line problems for a decade, while only just now addressing it with Zabel. In actuality, Seattle’s offensive line investment issues are more related to bad picks (both draftees and signees) whereas recent decisions like Cross and Lucas* seem pretty good!
*aside from the injuries
Everybody seemed to love Zabel going into the draft, we’ll just have to find out in the future if that pans out or not, but he’s not the Seahawks first attempt to do something right on the offensive line in over a decade.
Seattle had arguably the worst left guard in the NFL last season. They drafted his replacement with their first pick in the draft. We should be able to predict that if the Seahawks replaced a horrible left guard with a decent one and they already have a good left tackle (even PFN called Cross “a bright spot” on Seattle’s line) that a unit that was 28th-32nd might be slightly better.
But again — I’m not really worried if people “respect” the Seahawks or not. That doesn’t matter. People can believe that Seattle is the worst or second-worst offensive line in the NFL right now and given past issues with that unit and the potential for all these changes not to mesh well, they might even be right about the Seahawks.
They just have to address how significant those changes are!
Seahawks Offensive Line Changes RECAP!!!
Let’s review and add-on to Seattle’s 2024 to 2025 offensive line changes:
PERSONNEL
Left Guard: Laken Tomlinson OUT (99.73% of 2024 snaps), Zabel IN
Center: Connor Williams OUT (56.2% of 2024 snaps), Oluwatimi (39.8%) in competition with Jalen Sundell (5%)
Right Guard: Anthony Bradford (52.6% of 2024 snaps) in competition with Christian Haynes (15.2%) and maybe surprise candidates
Right Tackle: Stone Forsythe OUT (37.6% of 2024 snaps), Michael Jerrell BENCHED (22.7%), Lucas hopes to be BACK (37.2%)
If we take the Seahawks offensive line from the second half of 2024, then actually Cross, Oluwatimi, and Lucas all return to a unit that was not in the bottom of the rankings during that period of time, while also replacing the biggest weakness (Tomlinson) with a first round pick. Additionally, Cross enters his fourth season with an opportunity to make $30 million per season on an extension in 2026 if he puts in his best effort this year.
It is for many intents and purposes a contract year for Cross, while literally being a contract year for Lucas. There are massive monetary motivations at play here for both of Seattle’s bookends.
At right guard, the Seahawks invested back-to-back-to-back mid-round picks at the position over three years: Bradford, Haynes, and Bryce Cabeldue. In addition, they return Jerrell and Sataoa Laumea, have signed Josh Jones, and may still move Mason Richman inside. Out of seven options, can Seattle find one who is adequate?
That’s really just an excuse—it doesn’t mean that the Seahawks will have a good right guard—but many great offensive lines have a weakness and it is quite typical for that hole to be at right guard.
COACHING
It is also important to note that Seattle has overhauled their offensive coaching staff from last season:
Grubb to Kubiak being the one that should be apparent to everybody ranking offenses and offensive lines
New offensive line coach John Benton (career retrospective here) has 20 years of NFL experience, as opposed to Scott Huff, who had 0 prior to joining the Seahawks last season
Run game coordinator Rick Dennison was an assistant under Mike Shanahan on those 90s Broncos that I mentioned earlier and has personally tallied nine seasons as an NFL offensive line coach, in addition to 10 as an offensive coordinator
Assistant offensive line coach Justin Outten has nine years of NFL coaching experience, including one as an offensive coordinator and one as a run game coordinator
A fifth coach, Quinshon Odom, enters his second year as a quality control coach for the offensive line
I don’t know if it’s too many cooks or not, but the Seahawks didn’t just take one or two steps to alter the course of the future for the offensive line. They attacked the problems on the coaching staff like it was personal.
Why the Seahawks will most likely have a better offensive line in 2025
It could be fair to say that Seattle’s offensive line will improve because of the changes to the roster and the coaching staff that I’ve outlined that are being ignored elsewhere…but I don’t even think we need to go that far.
It’s enough to say that the Seahawks offensive line will improve because of regression. Any unit that was 32nd, 31st, or 30th last year stands a decent chance of being better next season based solely on the principle that “there’s nowhere to go but up”.
Yes, we have seen the Seattle Seahawks offensive line stink for multiple years in a row in the past. But that evidence alone does not prove a case that the Seahawks will be bad in 2025 because “they were bad in 2024 and they’re the SEAHAWKS!”
The Seahawks do not automatically get points deducted from their score because they’re using the same team name and uniforms as past seasons.
If the Seahawks have the worst offensive line in the league in 2025, it should at least be their most-surprising terrible offensive line season of the era. Because:
They did replace Tomlinson with Zabel
They do return a pretty good left tackle who is only 24
They hope to have Lucas back for an entire season
They were better in the second half last season with at least 60% of these starters
And they will have a new OC, a new OL coach, and a new OL assistant coach (Dennison) who are RIDICULOUSLY more experienced than the people who they are replacing
If the Seahawks OL is as bad as everyone apparently expects them to be, then so be it. But PFN and PFF won’t be right because they looked at the current team and properly evaluated where things stand in the present; it will be a lucky guess based on how fixated they allowed themselves to be on the past.
Seaside Joe 2321
Setting aside Hall of Famers Walter Jones and Steve Hutchinson, who is your favorite Seahawks O-lineman of all-time?
I believe if you took the same personnel we had last year and had to deal with all the same injuries, but put this coaching staff in charge, we'd have been mediocre. If these guys play well together, the media will talk about drafting Zabel, and Lucas getting healthy, and Cross taking the next step, but the best offseason addition will have been a couple of 60+ year old dudes.