English, I can give you 5 plays right now that players got blamed for in the first half Sunday night that where they were in a bad situation because either the call was bad or the Cards knew exactly what the play was, which is sometimes, but not always a ding on the OC.
I can also cite a couple of first half play callss that were damn good, and showed where Seattle had weaknesses to exploit, but simply didn't go back to until the 2nd half. And it wasn't all because we were behind the sticks.
The two worst first half plays were screens. We are an awful screen team. The one thing we should be good at, with the athletic linemen Seattle has, screens, and ours have all the rhythm of an unfolding lawn chair. Russell's butt fumble buffoonery gets laid at his feet, but it was a shitty screen where his only target got locked up. There was no secondary target. None. Laloosh posted a nice screen call vs the 'Boys with a secondary target that went for a good gain. The other near safety was also a failed screen with no secondary target, where Lynch had to throw a chip block before his route, and predictably was locked up by a Cards player leaving Russ zero options. I might add that it was the first time all game we had an ISO of Graham as the far left WR, and we used him as a decoy route that went away from the roll out.
I want to repeat one thing I just wrote. With our athletic line, the one thing we should be really good at is screens. We can say whatever we want about the inexperience of this group, but Seattle has been bad at screens for years. being well rehearsed at the execution of screens would remove a bit of the pressure off this group and use their one really good trait, their down field athleticism, to it's best.
Also, I want to point out that Bevell cited the penalties as a reason the offense was stagnant. True. However, one of those holding penalties lies at Bevell's feet. from 4 wide they motioned Willson to off left tackle for a run play, to stop a clear middle blitz by a Cards DB. I have no idea why they just didn't change the play, the matchups on the WRs were very favorable, but Willson was never ever going to get from off left tackle to square up a blitz in the middle of the line. He held, but he was put in position to fail. Just like Lynch on the two failed screens.
Seattle's extreme ineptitude at screens lies squarely on the coaching and design of the plays. If Marshawn is the only target on those plays, then having him chip block or be in position to get held up is inexcusable. That isn't scapegoating, that is a tell the truth ding on a specific play call. Screen calls are so very much on schedule when you are behind the sticks, but those two were so poorly designed that our QB looked like an idiot, when in actuality he had zero targets.
It is maddening to watch our offense in part because the ability to do really good things is so very clear. When Seattle finally got into a no huddle, stopped shuttling personnel on and off the field, lined up consecutive snaps in 4 wide with multiple speed threats, the Cards defense dissolved.
As far as the two superbowls thing, NFL history is littered with good teams and good QBs who outgrew coaches and coordinators. Dan Reeves nurtured a highly mobile Elway from day one, and took him to 3 SBs, but eventually lost his job because it was so clear that the rev limiter on the Broncos offense was the my way or no way Dan Reeves. The Super Bowls ceased to matter at some point, and that point was when it became clear that while his coaching had nurtured the growth of his QB, who needed that structure at first, his coaching had become a hindrance to future growth. I lived in Denver's fanbase at the time, many fans were pissed and cited 3 superbowls! as why Dan needed to stay, but history did show that his rigidity was a hindrance. It is my opinion that our offense is equally rigid. It is also my opinion that Pete, who says he believes in self scouting very much, better recognize that and change it before he is the next Dan Reeves.
As far as DVOA rankings on offense being some kind of indicator of genius, I don't buy it, for two reasons. Seattle's ranking was rooted in it's rushing, which was an outlier and it has been well stated multiple times that Cable coaches the run game, and could be viewed as unsustainable when your QB is going to eat a huge percentage of your cap. Organize those rankings into tiers, and Seattle ends up not so much different in passing efficiency than Miami. We hardly label that offense as awesome, do we? Take Russell's pass attempts turned scrambles off the rushing numbers and we suddenly don't look so efficient.
The MVP of the team being the field goal kicker is an indictment of the OC.
