If we were to consider 'mobility', we would absolutely be starting Geno over Sam. Which we are. Schneider and Macdonald have now both said this.
Id contend that is Geno's worst trait. He has awful pocket awareness. One of my biggest knocks on him. I think part of it is his processing speed. It's the single biggest thing that's keeping him from being an elite QB. Late throws and late in baling from the pocket. When Geno is on time, throwing in rhythm and getting the ball out quickly he looks like a world beater.
This hasn't really been Geno's problem as Seahawks starter and definitely not this past year. In 2022, he got sacked on 33% of pressures which was essentially league average. Not great but not terrible. (For context, Dak, Stafford, CJ Stroud, and Tua all had nearly the same sack-to-pressure rates this year.)
In 2023, though, Geno was only sacked on 23% of pressures, which was right around top 5, and he got better in the second half of the year. (If we look only from the Dallas game forward, where Geno specifically stated his goal was to throw guys open more aggressively, his sack-to-pressure ratio goes down to a mere 10%, which is basically as elite as it gets.)
And the thing is, in both 2022 and 2023 Geno has had a league average time to throw. He is
not holding the ball forever nor are all of his passes being slung out as soon as he hits his back foot.
This is in contrast to Howell who was getting sacked on 44% of pressures, which was--as you can guess--quite bad. Howell ALSO has a near league average time to throw so he's also not holding the ball forever. But he actually has far worse pocket awareness than Geno. (Geno also gained more yards per scramble than Howell as well.)
Did Howell live in a pass happy offense with mediocre offensive line and an inefficient run game and a bad defense so you were constantly trying to come from behind late? Yeah, but... what part of that description doesn't also apply to the Seahawks? (Well, the mediocre offensive line part doesn't apply because our O-Line was actually
worse at pass blocking than the Commanders'.)