We’re still running off the joyful fumes of a touchdown-less victory over the Indianapolis Colts are we not?
I wrote earlier about the struggles on offense being more tied to the line than the quarterback, and that conversation has been full of cheer. That sets us up beautifully for this:
The Seattle Seahawks should drastically scale back the run game in order to set up the pass.
This is not clickbait. I haven’t spoken to John Gilbert in days. This is about a team that has swung the pendulum in its
own skillset, a league that has finally adjusted successfully on defense, and an NFL fact that the Seahawks themselves proved this year.
Let’s begin.
Both Sam Darnold and Jaxon Smith-Njigba are absolute merchants in the play action game, still. 5 for 8 is not legendary, but 92 yards on five completions is very good. 7 out of 8 should have been caught, which would have been wonderful.
Even with a perceived decline over the last month, the Seahawks still have the second-highest explosive play rate on offensive passing.
Additionally, you may remember the following, which became its own feature on Seattle Sports Radio in November. The Seahawks have been a highly successful team in the air while rarely using shotgun or passing on first down.
But after 14 games, Seattle is ranked 22nd in rush yards per game, despite being fifth in attempts per game. Of all teams in the top-10 in attempts per game, only the San Francisco 49ers have less success running.
All season long, the Seahawks proved something both interesting and fun early While it was working. Now, scoring just 18, 19, and 19 points on offense in three of their last five games, it’s time to prove it again.
Thus, Seattle needs to abandon the run game.
This is not “running backs don’t matter.” That movement was dumb; they do. Nor is this “Let Sam Cook.”
It’s actually something that Seattle already proved this year. Namely, a team does not need to be good at running the ball, to be good at play action. The Seahawks are the best play action team in the league. DVOA success on play action is nearly five points better than 2nd and 3rd, over 20 points better than the fourth-best Rams! Because they have a good run game? No, they’re horrible.
And unfortunately, for much of this year, Kenneth Walker being even less effective than Zach Charbonnet. Charbonnet, who is in fact, the better pass blocker as well. In all of November plus December, Walker’s YPC has been 4.15 while Charbonnet’s has been 4.5.
If Seattle wants to take a serious shot at this division, they need to score more than 18/19 points against the Rams and 49ers. After the defense, the passing attack, namely play action to their trio plus AJ Barner, or anything to JSN, is their best weapon.
The Seahawks already proved everyone wrong in that you don’t need to be good at the run to set up the pass. I think they’ve got one more step in them. I don’t think they need to run the ball anywhere near as much as they do to set up the pass. It’s not working. Especially not with Walker. Seattle still faces ridiculous levels of stacked boxes as teams gear up to stop the run. Great. Run play action to death, whether or not there’s much running. Klint Kubiak has this in him; there have been minor adjustments this season, but not this yet. They’re not running out of time to make the postseason obviously, but they are running out of wiggle room to take the division.
This decision should be made by sheer discrepancy alone. Seattle is the better passing team. They need the points. What has already been established is that you don’t need running success to generate play action success. I’m suggesting that with how defenses have schemed, and how bad the RB situation (particularly Walker) has been, they don’t need running attempts to generate play action success. If nothing else, it may force a little bit of oppositional re-adjustment to where they occasional play action hand-off – also known as a run play – might catch ‘em off guard.
It’s December. We’re allowed to hope.
