The Seattle Seahawks’ lone appearance (barring any flexing for the rest of the season) on Sunday Night Football was loud and eye-opening for much of America. If most of the country was asleep for the Monday night win over the Houston Texans, millions were wide awake to see Seattle destroy the Washington Commanders in their own building. A night meant to honor the 1980s Super Bowl teams and retire the great Art Monk’s jersey number turned into disaster literally from the opening kickoff, and the Seahawks never
looked back on their way to a 38-14 win.
It’s Enemy Reaction time, which means it’s time to visit Hogs Haven and see how Commanders fans are feeling after a brutal loss. The Commanders are a Seahawks-heavy organization from the roster through the coaching staff and front office, so they’re like Seattle East in a way. Their
As an aside, I opted not to include any game thread reactions from the Jayden Daniels left arm injury. All I’ll say is that our game thread was extremely respectful and sad for Daniels while wishing him the best.
Tory Horton interfered with, scores touchdown anyway (7-0 SEA)
Ty Okada makes incredible interception (7-0 SEA)
Another touchdown for Tory Horton (14-0 SEA)
Commanders fumble kickoff, Seahawks recover (14-0 SEA)
Elijah Arroyo scores first NFL touchdown (21-0 SEA)
Cody White scores his first NFL touchdown (28-0 SEA)
Jayden Daniels gets the Commanders on the board (28-7 SEA)
Mikey Sainristil picks off Sam Darnold (31-7 SEA)
A.J. Barner tush pushes into the end zone (38-7 SEA, 38-14 FINAL)
Post-game recap: Coaching malpractice to blame for Jayden Daniels injury (Dean Jones, Riggo’s Rag)
It was a pointless exercise. Placing the franchise player under fire when the blowout was confirmed was malpractice. Quinn and his staff will rightfully receive criticism, and this poor lack of judgment could have a far greater ripple effect when it’s all said and done.
Obviously, further tests will be carried out, but Daniels is probably done for the year. And that falls squarely on Quinn for keeping him under center when there was absolutely no need.
Daniels is a competitive guy who’s already missed time this season. That alone should have been enough to be cautious, but the notion must have slipped the mind of Quinn as he watched his team suffer yet another embarrassing beatdown on the national stage.
Now, the Commanders are going to pay a heavy price. Daniels is the beating heart of the franchise, dragging them from obscurity and into the NFC Championship game last time around. This year hasn’t come close to matching that level, and things are going to get a lot worse before they get better without the LSU product leading the charge.
That’s on the coaching staff.
Post-game recap article: This was all avoidable (Barry Svrluga, Washington Post)
This is emotional. This is dire. The season dawned with a promise that hadn’t been felt around this franchise for a generation or more. Just past the midway point, the about-face is dizzying. The left elbow injury Daniels suffered in the waning moments of a lost cause was gruesome, and if the announcement comes later this week that he’ll be out for the remainder of the season, who among us would be surprised?
It all leaves a pang in the stomach. And it was all 100 percent avoidable.
[…]
Dan Quinn has a lot to digest coming out of his worst loss as Commanders coach. He’ll say it’s about getting his team to develop its identity and correct its mistakes. But it has to eat at him that the players who remain will be doing it without their most talented colleague — all because he kept Jayden Daniels in a game he had no business being in, and a season that already was spiraling is now lost because of it.
Post-game video rant: Disaster (Burgundy and Bold)
The Commanders are a cooked and bad team, but you know what? Seattle has twice destroyed bad opposition; one on the road and one at home. This is what great teams do. You’re not always going to beat the top opponents but if you want to assert yourself as a potentially elite unit, handling vastly inferior opposition is the way to do it. We seldom saw that through the back-end of the Pete Carroll era and a good chunk of Mike Macdonald’s transitional first season. In year two under Coach Macdonald, we’re seeing those blowout victories back on the menu.
Will a blowout happen against the Arizona Cardinals? I doubt it. Arizona is 2-5 (pending tonight’s game against the Dallas Cowboys) but the Cards have lost three times in walk-off fashion and have a -1 point differential. The Cardinals clearly aren’t a good team but they’re a divisional opponent worth respecting, as the Seahawks found out when they let a 20-6 lead slip in the first meeting. For all we know, Kyler Murray may not even be starting the rematch in Seattle, which may be a good thing for him given his historic struggles at Lumen Field. It’s still an important game for the Seahawks for tiebreaker reasons—Arizona ain’t factoring into the division race, it’s all about keeping up with the San Francisco 49ers and Los Angeles Rams in terms of divisional tiebreakers.
Buckle up, folks. A special season could be upon us. But first, trade deadline coverage. Stay tuned for that over the next two days.
Thanks for reading and go ‘Hawks!
