Is It Youth?

CalgaryFan05

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I just wonder how much PC is going to tarnish his own legacy amongst the fanbase when he keeps spewing out this "positive" crap when anyone can see that we haven't been a serious contender for going on a decade, that our defense has been pretty bad for years now considering the resourcesw we've put into it, that decisions are always made to "win right now" even though that formula has led us to being nothing more than a fringe playoff team.

It's becoming Groundhog Day every year. It's so obvious that change is needed I can't help those who can't see it. It's not working.

Right now I have more optimism about the Cardinals than I do us now.
What happened this season on D with the acquisitions and the pissing away of talent -

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - is CRIMINAL.

This season was NOT supposed to go this way. It didn't start this way. We had the dogs. Now we have to hope for a Bears win?

FFS.

200
 

Jac

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It's coaching and scheme. If we had better coaching and scheme, youth is an advantage. We're not losing because of youth-related mistakes. We're losing because we don't have winning game plans and that's shown up as general confusion and apathy.
 

xray

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It's not about the youth on the roster ; it's about that old guy chewing gum on the sidelines ; who has kept this team entrenched in mediocrity for several years . imo
 

Welshers2

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I'll tell you the single biggest problem with this team and it's not even debatable in my opinion:

Two of the worst safeties in the league take up 20% of the salary cap. That's 1/5th of our cap being taken up by guys getting outperformed by dudes on minimum contracts. Think of how what that money could do on the D-line.
 

themunn

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I don't buy youth as being the biggest problem. The Packers, Rams, Bengals (lost QB), and Colts are the youngest teams and they seem to be headed in the right direction. It's coaching.

2 nine win team (Rams, Colts) and 3 eight win teams - plus ourselves at 8 wins.

So we seem to be in pretty much exactly the same spot they all are in
 

bileever

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The problem is not youth (or yutes, as Joe Pesci would say). I've been complaining about the roster all year, but I'm not even sure that's the problem, either. I think that the problem is the secret sauce.

Good teams have that secret sauce that makes everyone better. Every season, teams come out of nowhere or take a huge step forward. Teams suddenly turn their seasons around. And most of the time, you can't put your finger on what happened.

Well, we didn't have the secret sauce this year. We weren't able to improve on last year, even with the influx of additional talent. You would think that just adding JSN, Witherspoon and Bobby Wagner to last year's team would be enough for a step forward. But it wasn't because we didn't have the secret sauce.

 

TheLegendOfBoom

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Youth???

I guess HOF vets like Bobby Wagner, and pro bowl vets like DK Metcalf, Tyler Lockett, Leonard Williams, etc. and notable players like Julian Love, Jordyn Brooks, Jarran Reed, Ken Walker, Boye Mafe, aren’t doing a “good enough” job at leading the first and second year players….complete BS.

Carroll attempting to save his own ass as usual. This is all coaching. The young talent is there but good coaching has seemingly vanished.
 

MOCHawk

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I also think youth is a poor excuse. I'm a Pete apologist/proponent but I feel for the first time in his tenure that he doesn't have a W/L record indicative of his talent. Seems like 11-5 talent with an 8-8 result. I don't see any position group being especially weak. Two losses to the Rams and that loss last week at home to a backup QB really don't cut it. A few have mentioned that they were playing better early in the season, but I disagree. The schedule just got much, much harder.
 

DeSeahawk

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I'd imagine these guys have been taught to tackle since they were little. Youth isn't the issue. If it didnt sound ridiculous, you would think they are now being coached NOT to tackle. Worst tackling team we have ever had imo . That's coaching
 

ZagHawk

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If its a youth issue, we would see undisciplined play the first half of the season that resulted in sad losses but a team that got increasingly more disciplined, consistent and put together towards the second half of the season (Think 2012). The only thing consistent is the inconsistency through this entire season. It is not the youth, it is the coaching.
 

ZagHawk

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I'd imagine these guys have been taught to tackle since they were little. Youth isn't the issue. If it didnt sound ridiculous, you would think they are now being coached NOT to tackle. Worst tackling team we have ever had imo . That's coaching


The horrible tackling reminds me of the tackling you see in an off-season game that cleans up quickly in the first couple games of the regular season. Seeing it in the final games of the season is a red alert.
 

cymatica

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The defense isn't that young and that's the main issue. I've also always been under the impression that you usually want to have more experience on offense. Defense is fine having mostly younger guys with some vets in key spots. The LOB defense was full of young talent.
 

morgulon1

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Personally, I don't want my coach to aspire to be adept enough to deal with the most heinous, abrasive, and entitled fans and media members in the entire nation.

Then again, Pete DID coach in both of those cities before he became Pete.

On the real though, yes, obviously this is an excuse and youth alone isn't a reason for the lack of success. A seeming inability to develop young players? Now that's a better answer. But what Pete said is a good answer to give publicly because it implicates no one. There's no reason to start firing bullets now. Keep it close to the vest and generic. Nothing can be gained by revealing anything past what is necessary, and that's a good policy for any professional organization to follow.

Pete does this a lot. I don't really jive with it when people dog him for a lack of accountability. I don't think people would be satisfied with his level of accountability unless he flagellated himself in a presser, resigned, and proceeded to become a reclusive monk. Part of this is because he fulfills the function of the head executive well in terms of attributing very little PUBLIC blame to other parties, which allows it to properly funnel onto his plate as the head honcho.

Is it as entertaining for us? No. But it's smarter.

If he's pissed at certain coaches, why badmouth them in public? You'd want to do right by any coach under you, even if you're about to can him. These guys live on their reputations, and you don't want to damage anyone else's if you can help it. Even if the guys do stink, they have put in a hell of a lot of time and effort to go into battle with you and for you. Keep it classy and keep it close to the vest.

If he's pissed at certain players... I mean, obviously don't roast your own players past simple statements of accountability. Don't piss off your own locker room, and don't piss off guys who you may not want to lose. Don't hurt their possible future trade value. All that jazz.

I was getting into my daily skinning of Pete and then you have to come at me with this logical , well thought out post
that makes sense.

Damn .

(I'm still upset tho)
 

Kamcussionator

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"Youth" is a partial excuse as to why we couldn't seem to put 60 consecutive minutes of football together all season. Lack of focus, consistency, and finishing have plagued us all season long. But what I really think is what's missing is emergent leadership.

Bobby is at the end of his career. I'm sure he is respected in that locker room, but nobody expects him to be around in 1-2 years. Same could be said of Adams, Smith, Lockett, and Diggs. So the catch-22 for Pete is: do you dump all your vets to make room for someone in the next generation to step up? What if they don't? What if they turn to someone like DK who doesn't seem to get it's a team game? Or do you drag it out with the same warhorses and hope that some young buck finally grabs the mantle? My feeling is that Pete is sticking with the latter. That would be consistent with his "always compete" philosophy.

He's already let Bobby walk once, so perhaps this offseason he does again. Adams is getting the nice-version of Denver's Russell Wilson treatment. Lockett and Diggs are more subtle leaders so I believe they stay. Smith is going to get some more serious competition this offseason, from Lock as well as high-ceiling draft pick. So far he's been the locker room's pick, but he's not been a dynamic leader and I think he still suffers from Imposter Syndrome.

PCJS draft leaders, but it's an organic process for a locker room leader to emerge. Not what a frustrated, impatient fan wants to hear, but I think it's the only way to build a great team. The only thing a new head coach would buy us at this point as fans is a window of "wait and see" that would alleviate our immediate frustration.
 

knownone

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After watching the press conference, it's a stretch to label his explanation an excuse. He wasn't deflecting blame or avoiding accountability. He answered a question about why they were revisiting the fundamentals of tackling and explained why those techniques might need to be revisited during the season. Youth was one of those reasons.
 

nanomoz

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I think that Pete's message has gone stale, and his methods are no longer competitive against the Hawks's two most-important division rivals. The players know it. They're not dumb.
 

Seahawk_Dan

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Saying that it's just the young players and they don't get it is an excellent excuse for the 72 year old Boomer coach to say.

Youth can be a factor in the sense of lacking experience, sure, however many of the problem Seattle has it has had for years now. It's coaching and it's Pete.
 

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