Russell Wilson Under Pressure -- PFF Article

[Hawks46]

I'm with The Outfield; I'm not sure we're going to get that elite #1 WR that most folks covet: we just don't get the targets and yards a guy like that really wants.

As for the OP, I'm with you in wanting to upgrade the OL, but it's going to come via the draft, and it's going to be more guys like Britt. Britt will get better, and we will all laugh about how much we didn't like him as a rookie. Thing is, the kid can run block like a mofo.

We won't be able to spend a lot on the OL. We'll probably say good bye to Okung unless he takes a value contract for us. With Russ's contract and the Defense we just won't be able to afford a lot on the OL (throw in a good WR as well, that'll cost us). I hear "fire Cable" a lot, and um,,well that's just not going to happen.

If I went to a HC and told him "hey, I can give you two borderline Pro Bowl players, and the rest it doesn't really matter...UDFA, 7th rounders, you name it, and I can craft you the #1 rushing offense in the NFL" and have a resume to prove it....how many guys you think would hire me ? EVERY one that values a running game. And EVERY one that doesnt' have an elite Franchise QB. There are guys that want to sling the ball more, but every HC in the league understands how important it is to run the ball.

That's why we have to pay Russ. He alleviates the need (and the cost) of having to have elite pass protection (hi Peyton Manning !). I don't like the one stat that the article threw out there, as it's to general. How many times have we seen IMMEDIATE (read: less than 2 seconds pressure) on him the last two years ? So if Russ counts "one thousand one" and has a 300 pounder in his lap, then he pulls the ball down and runs for his life, all the while looking down the field to make a play, well yea that counts as "holding the ball too long" and it probably goes over 2.5 seconds. It also likely isn't going to go well, as I don't know a whole lot of OC's that design a play to get your QB blown up immediately.

The other thing...what goes into that stat ? Does it account for all the times Wilson held the ball too long, then pulled it down and ran with it ? Running the ball won't make Wilson's QB Rating better, but it's a positive play, it kills the defense, and it usually moves the chains. Many times, it's an explosive play, one that doesnt' get counted in a QB Rating.

I definately think Wilson holds the ball too long at times. I also am in the camp of wanting at least one better WR. Either a bigger bodied guy that can make the contested catch, or a guy that creates quick mismatches with separation (think a Emmanuel Sanders or Antonio Brown guy). We need to have one guy that tilts the field, messes with coverage and creates a mismatch somewhere. We see what's possible with the stat from the article, even if I find it a bit misleading.

 

[SeatownJay]

Serious question here, if we did have a true #1 receiver with size, would you trust Bevell to use him correctly?

 

[hawksfansinceday1]

Serious question here, if we did have a true #1 receiver with size, would you trust Bevell to use him correctly?

Serious response.............not sure I would. Dude is just so freakin' slow to adjust to what a defense is doing.

 

[SDHawk]

Serious question here, if we did have a true #1 receiver with size, would you trust Bevell to use him correctly?

In 2009, Sidney Rice had 83 receptions for 1,312 yards and 8 touchdowns.

Bevell's offense was 8th in the league for Passing Yards per Game.

 

[Natethegreat]

This is why I so wanted the Seahawks to go all out and trade up for Mike Evans last year. He would be an absolute monster here with Russ throwing him the ball and no attitude problems to deal with and under team control for 5 years.

 

[Leee-roy]

I was watching the Steelers / Bengals game and drooling at all the time Big Ben had to look around and throw the ball.
If Russ had that much time without the stress of "who's coming to crush me and from where", he'd look a lot better, as would the receivers . I think this year's O line is a step down from last year as far as pass blocking goes.

 

[Ad Hawk]

I was watching the Steelers / Bengals game and drooling at all the time Big Ben had to look around and throw the ball.
If Russ had that much time without the stress of "who's coming to crush me and from where", he'd look a lot better, as would the receivers . I think this year's O line is a step down from last year as far as pass blocking goes.

And maybe the defensive lines we faced were also better.

 

[evergreen]

Everyone, including me, is obsessed with the big wide receiver. However, getting one doesnt necessarily mean a winning team, just boosted stats. Fans always scream for a better wide receiver, have for years. But look at this years top 10, from espn:

1 Antonio Brown, WR PIT 122 168 1,570 12.9 12 54 18 104.7 1 568 80
2 Julio Jones, WR ATL 100 156 1,535 15.4 6 79 30 109.6 2 553 72
3 Demaryius Thomas, WR DEN 103 167 1,504 14.6 11 86 23 100.3 0 647 64
4 Jordy Nelson, WR GB 92 143 1,433 15.6 13 80 18 95.5 0 481 66
5 T.Y. Hilton, WR IND 82 127 1,345 16.4 7 73 21 96.1 3 372 62
6 Emmanuel Sanders, WR DEN 95 132 1,331 14.0 9 48 23 88.7 1 370 66
7 Golden Tate, WR DET 96 137 1,286 13.4 4 73 17 85.7 1 691 55
8 Jeremy Maclin, WR PHI 82 137 1,269 15.5 10 72 19 84.6 0 489 54
9 Dez Bryant, WR DAL 84 132 1,221 14.5 14 68 20 81.4 0 352 58
10 Randall Cobb, WR GB 87 121 1,207 13.9 10 70 22 80.5 1 556 67

How many super bowl winners? You got Nelson and Tate, but he wasnt a mega star with us last year. Calvin Johnson, and Aj Green both dont have one. Would you consider Hines Ward a big time receiver? Because he's got two. What about TO? None. Moss? None.

I would say, if you want a big time catcher, you're going to blow your load. Once you do that you have to give him the ball a lot (like we did with percy, although they would go deep more, probably). That takes away from other guys, like we've seen.

I think Russell is just going to keep doing what hes doing with mediocre wide outs. Maybe develop more chemistry with the tight ends, but I don't see this team ever splurging again on a big time WR. We aren't the packers, if you look at their philosophy of how to build a team, and compare it to ours it really is quite different.

How about one like Michael Irvin? He's got rings. It doesn't have to be a mega star though, we need to fill that void.

 

[SalishHawkFan]

Wilson looked very sharp in a quick passing offense early in the year. I think he had something like a 114 passer rating going into the Dallas game, and then it all went in the crapper.

We saw some of that sharpness in the quick passing game return vs. Arizona.

I think we've actually seen some very encouraging progress from Russell this year as a pocket passer, but it's masked by a brutal yet seemingly random cold stretch in the middle of the year when he had Tebow-esque accuracy issues for no apparent reason. You take away the avalanche of off-target throws in the middle of the year and Wilson is probably a serious MVP candidate right now.

Regardless, I agree that we need a #1 WR. I think if you get Wilson a crafty OC and a true #1 and he'd likely blow up like Brady in 2007.

I heard the announcer mention in passing that Wilson looked like he was over that thumb injury. I was like "what thumb injury?" Maybe he'd heard something that hadn't otherwise leaked? I don't know, but it left me wondering. Makes sense if true.

 

[olyfan63]

Wilson looked very sharp in a quick passing offense early in the year. I think he had something like a 114 passer rating going into the Dallas game, and then it all went in the crapper.

We saw some of that sharpness in the quick passing game return vs. Arizona.

I think we've actually seen some very encouraging progress from Russell this year as a pocket passer, but it's masked by a brutal yet seemingly random cold stretch in the middle of the year when he had Tebow-esque accuracy issues for no apparent reason. You take away the avalanche of off-target throws in the middle of the year and Wilson is probably a serious MVP candidate right now.

Regardless, I agree that we need a #1 WR. I think if you get Wilson a crafty OC and a true #1 and he'd likely blow up like Brady in 2007.

I heard the announcer mention in passing that Wilson looked like he was over that thumb injury. I was like "what thumb injury?" Maybe he'd heard something that hadn't otherwise leaked? I don't know, but it left me wondering. Makes sense if true.

I opined at the time, middle of this season, in this forum, that I thought Russell was injured, and the team was covering it up, that his blatant inaccuracy seemed like a sign of an injury.
People mostly poo-pooed the idea.
Russell was so uncharacteristically inaccurate, no other explanation really made sense.

I sorta recall Russell had a covered-up injury last year too that also resulted in poor passing performance in a stretch of games, and we much later learned about it.

So I'm on board with the thumb injury theory. Glad it seems to be better now.

 

[netskier]

IIRC, you had the most comprehensive discussion of possible injuries underlying Wilson's passing inaccuracies. That was a great post.

I do recall seeing Russell get hit in the head quite a few times this year, and I think these hits explain both his failures to see and failures to think quickly incidents.

IIRC, Tokadub was the only one to hypothesize a single reason for Wilson's failure to see open receivers and slower decisions: concussions and brain damage. Slower decisions and failure to perceive open receivers were observed and bemoaned roughly in weeks four through eight.

Failure to see can be explained by failure to look (Olys theory), or by failure to perceive due to brain impairment and/damage (Tokadubs) hypothesis, or by the sum of both effects (my hypothesis).

But, I think slower decisions can best be explained by the two kinds of trauma induced brain impairments (temporary concussions and/or permanent damages).

 

[netskier]

Typo note. Second paragraph was intended to be the last one.

 

[theincrediblesok]

I remember watching a Pete Press Conference and someone asked a question about Rusell, maybe about getting hit hard or playing injured and Pete said that Russ is the type that won't tell him if something is bothering him. Anyone know which week that was for that press conference?

 

[Polk738]

I'm not sure if we even did have a true #1 receiver that it'd make THAT big of a difference, we just don't throw the ball enough to honestly know mainly because we don't have to. As long as we have ML we probably never will be much of a passing team. I think I'd rather have a great pass catching TE who can block-you can tell we really missed Zach Miller this year just in that aspect alone.

 

[lsheldon]

The Pete Carroll NFL Sound FX video from the Rams game on NFL.com has an interesting exchange between Carroll and Allen discussing Russell getting rid of the ball quicker. Pete tells Paul to remember him emphasizing it to Russell a couple of weeks earlier.

It would be interesting to find out what the comparison is between ball release time and pressure in the 4 games they lost and the last 4 they dominated.

Link to Sound FX, Carroll and Allen exchage about 25 seconds in: http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-films-sou ... te-Carroll

 

[MontanaHawk05]

It's not the big WR we need, but instead a decent offensive line. It's the pressure you mentioned causes the problems.

It's really not.

 

[onanygivensunday]

But if we had a big time #1 receiver, would we have been able to keep KJ & Cliff?

The answer is "no"... especially when you add Bobby and Russell to that list.

There too many key players on defense that are getting paid... and for good reason.

An established true #1 receiver is a luxury that Seattle cannot currently afford.

For example, Demaryius Thomas and Dez Bryant are about to be paid and both will command something in the vicinity of $14M/year on average (cap hit).

That's too rich for Seattle's blood.

 

[Hawkscanner]

The numbers that Pro Football Focus cites simply underscore what many of our eyes have told us for some time -- that Russell Wilson (when he gets rid of the ball quickly) is an amazing QB. When he holds on to it, look out.

But WHY is Russell holding on to the ball so long on so many plays? That is the key question. I would say that the problem has been twofold ...

1) Offensive Line play -- the line has been pretty shoddy all season long. Due to Unger's injury and Sweezy's and Carpenter's inconsistent play, teams have been able to get pressure right up the gut. Justin Britt has struggled quite a bit in pass protection as well this year. As a result, Russell has been running for his life a good percentage of the time. Part of the reason that he holds the ball so long is that he's spending a lot of time dodging and running away from defenders. During those few times he's actually had a clean pocket, he's looked pretty good. Outside of re-signing Russell Wilson and Bobby Wagner, addressing the woes of this offensive line has to rank as priority #1 this coming offseason.

2) That said, production from the WR spot has been the other part of the issue. Russell is also holding the ball so long because many, many times guys simply aren't getting open. Sidney Rice was brought up and that's precisely the point. Since 2012, this team has missed Sidney Rice from an offensive standpoint. It's missed a receiver who can really stretch a defense -- someone whom the defense has had to respect. Why did Carroll and Schneider invest so much to bring in Percy Harvin? That's exactly why. Those guys know that this receiving corps (as a whole) benefits from having a real big play making WR out there. A Sidney Rice type -- someone with great hands who can consistently beat press coverage, has the moves to juke opposing DB's out of their socks, and who has the instincts to consistently bail the QB out when he's in trouble -- is exactly what this Seahawks team has been missing. A guy like that makes the entire offense better because he makes those DB's back off and creates space for everyone else.

And I'm obviously not the only one who believes that this team needs that #1 play making receiver. Several people in this thread and out there have argued that point. Our old friend Doug Farrar was in for Jerry Brewer on KJR on New Year's Day ... and he and Matt Waldman from Football Outsiders talked about that at length. Waldman discussed guys like Kasen Williams, Duke Williams, Jalen Strong, and Dorial Green Beckham (a very intriguing guy if he can put his issues behind him) in connection with the Hawks.

Rob over at Seahawks Draft Blog has a great article up right now on Minnesota TE Maxx Williams of the Gophers -- a very intriguing possibility that could help to actually cure some of both ills.

Now, we can all argue if Darrell Bevell is going to have the wherewithal to utilize a WR of that magnitude correctly (his simplistic route concepts drive me nuts at times) ... but as SDHawk pointed out, Bevell's passing offenses have put up good numbers in the past.

As far as the "can we keep" such a guy long term -- I would say that we at least have him under club control for 3-5 years. You can win a whole lot more NFC Championships and Super Bowls during that time. If this Seahawks team develops a deadly offense to go along with its already deadly defense -- Look Out!

 

[MizzouHawkGal]

I didn't see this posted anywhere yet, so thought I would bring it to people's attention who hadn't seen it yet. Pro Football Focus just put out an interesting analysis piece on Russell Wilson under pressure this season. Here is the link to that article ...

https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2014/12/27/seahawks-russell-under-pressure/

They noted that Wilson is the most pressured QB in the league (on 46% of his dropbacks, he faces pressure from defenders).

Wilson averages 2.90 seconds from snap to release (longest of any QB in the NFL).

When Wilson gets rid of the ball in 2.5 seconds or less ... he has a QB Rating of 113.2 and a pass completion% of 73.9%

When Wilson holds the ball for longer than 2.5 seconds (which happens 54% of the time) ... his QB Rating falls to 75.7 (17th in the NFL)

Do we need any clearer indicator of just how badly this WR corps (as a whole) is in need of being upgraded? Can you imagine what Russell Wilson would look like if he had a Larry Fitzgerald (in his prime), a Calvin Johnson, etc. to throw to? What would Wilson look like if he had that elite #1 receiver --- someone whom the defense had to really respect, back off of, and as a result made the entire rest of the receiving corps better? I don't know if Richardson can be that guy or not, but if I'm John Schneider I'm not putting all my eggs in that basket. Upgrading the receiving corps and the offensive line have to rank priority #1 and #1A. We can debate the order, but I doubt few will disagree those are the top priorities (outside of getting Wilson and Wagner signed to long term deals, that is).

I assume the question is rhetorical in nature?

As you say later the issue is twofold..

1. Subpar OL but that can be mitagated far easier then the second issue
2. Average to below average WR corps but given just one #1 level or near WR that goes away as does the OL issues because Wilson will be able to flip the percentages of holding the ball immediately. This is why I hope we try and get Justin Blackmon or maybe take a total flyer on Josh Gordon if Cleveland is willing. And work either of them in with Norwood and Richardson and be set for the next 4-5 years if it works out.

If we do neither I would just say try and develop somebody in house through the draft given for the next 2-3 years we really should be drafting pretty much for the offense in any case.

 

[EntiatHawk]

I think instead of going after a big time WR we develop one. Hopefully someone like Norwood or Prich will develop into that that type of receiver.

I always thought a receiver that is super physical, like a Brandon Marshall would be awesome here. I think we all can now appreciate the type of receiver Rice was with us. If not for injury he was the type of receiver who would really worked well in this system.

Maybe a sleeper receiver next year, we can hope. I think we will most likely develop one in house though.