Your post was great and to tie in to the end here. So your statement is that we should do the same against Chicago as you said we should do against Miami (I completely agree)

Watch us come out and run straight up the middle against Chicago.........over and over and over and over and over and over and over again..........

People in hell want ice water...

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Official Tharold Simon Fan Club Member

I have not watched Chicago as much as I have Miami, so I don't know that. I do know that Chicago has not been easy to pass on this year. I also know they are a little banged up in the front 7.

I don't think having a game plan biased one way or the other is the answer. I like being multiple. Kaepernick was making call changes in his first start based on the looks the Chicago D was giving him. If Chicago had not shown defensively such a commitment to run stopping, I don't doubt that we would have seen the Niners run a lot more to start that game. That is what I mean by multiple. Their personnel groups said run, and they could have, but they had pass options out of all those run sets, and they used those options when the Bears responded with obvious run biased defense.

Pete has said more than once that he does not want to see his quarterback throw the ball 40 times a game. Pete has said more than once he values controlling the clock. He says repeatedly that good execution is the key on offense. He also says he wants a "multiple" offense. Those first three statements feel at odds to me with the last one. The statements about executing the plays being the key to offense are kinda bullshit anyway, because they ignore that there are some mismatches on the field you can't defeat purely through execution (see Paul Soliei and Randy Starks in the Miami game). Those guys get paid too, and their job is to mess up your execution. Execution has to come with exploiting matchups, and continuous running into the middle of Miami's D was ignoring several matchup problems. And failed to exploit some pretty easy passing matchup wins, particularly on first down.
So yeah, the play calling was bad, but the game plan was worse, because it was predicated on our defense winning the day.

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SEAHAWKS.NET. We All We Got, We All We Need

It's a conservative-based offense, designed to control the clock and limit turnovers.

And it's not going to change.

As always, it comes down to a few plays - even when the play calling is suspect. We are losing games by very narrow margins. Going backwards on our last possession was a death knell. Baldwin not making that catch hurt.

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@SeahawkGreg

YEAH, WE HAVE A DUDE NAMED CHRISTINE...DEAL WITH IT!

Like I said before they passed almost 60% of the time.I doubt that was the plan going in.I guess he needed to call plays that gain yardage with poor blocking or that overcome stupid penalties.The last play Wilson got sacked by a 3 man rush.I wonder which play he should have called there.
What film?The film of Tenn,Buff. and Indy who all ran the ball and beat Miami?.The film of the Rams hanging 162 yards rushing on them?
There was no reason for the coaches to believe we couldnt run on them unless you think these teams are better than the Hawks are.
That last drive was supposed to eat up time.And it was doing just that.They had a 3rd and 4 and a 3rd and 5.Any good QB should like those situations.Lynch had a couple 5 yrd runs and was looking good.
Those last 2 plays had nothing to do with running the ball to often.It was sad execution on the 2 pass plays.

If Bevell gets canned, there are going to be some interesting offensive coordinator candidates available.

- Tom Cable (currently on staff, not totally sold on him as a full time OC though)
- Norv Turner (GREAT OC.. awful head coach)
- Andy Reid (would he subject himself to a year of OC though? not sure)
- Ken Whisenhunt (as the Cardinals continue to freefall, his seat gets hotter)
- Rob Chudzinski (If Rivera is canned, the whole staff is likely going with him.. Chudzinski is not a bad coordinator though)

Of these.. the idea of Norv Turner having full control of the offense has me the most excited. Especially with a young QB.

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Seahawks vs. TBD - Super Bowl 48 - February 2, 2014

@justafan. I watched all three of those Miami games you reference. They all passed the ball with success on Miami before they ran it well, and in the case of Tennessee, Locker ran for a large chunk of those yards in the first quarter while scrambling. All three of those teams opened with a lot of first down passing.

Also, those last two bad plays before the third down sack were as much about Miami knowing they only had to defend 6 yards of field to keep us out of field goal range. That was abundantly clear by then. And the last pass play? What do you think the success rate on third and 16 is in the NFL? It is less than 20%.

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SEAHAWKS.NET. We All We Got, We All We Need

Which of those guys can you see Pete actually wanting? Maybe Chud, but none of the rest, with the obvious exception of Cable.

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SEAHAWKS.NET. We All We Got, We All We Need

I am still playing that over in my mind....

Does anyone remember in "Flash Gordon" back in the 80's, the football fight, queen is jamming...you are just pumped up...and that dip shit hits him in the head with the egg?

16-16...woo...record setting! There Warren Moon on the radio!!

FLUNKing BAM...metal egg in the head. Drive stalls...game over essentially

We did throw the ball with success prior to that drive.I am just not in the blame the playcall camp.I think most plays fail because of execution.If it is a matchup problem the QB has some responsibility to get us into a better play.
I just get tired of people blaming playcalls on both sides of the ball when we lose.It doesn't matter who the coordinaters are people will want them fired.Its always been that way and always will be.
I wish we had more info on what freedom Wilson has with audibles.I think with time he will get us into different plays when its called for.

Oh, give me a break; trying to run as much as we did in the 4th quarter after having horrible results trying to run for the first three is squarely the fault of the offensive coordinator calling the plays. If we had tried in the first half a lot like we did, and then tried a lot less in the second half, THAT would be the sign of an intelligent play-caller. Instead, we kept bashing our head against a brick wall until the final whistle blew. Hell, on the last running play of the game, Bevell was probably thinking "Their defense has to get tired enough to allow good runs at SOME point, we can still do this!"

...

I don't want anybody fired.
There is plenty of blame to go around on both play calls and execution. For example, in what world can Leroy Hill cover Devone Bess on a crossing route, even if he executes perfectly? A mismatch is a mismatch, and not exploiting them can fall at the feet of playcalling.

Pete has blamed playcalling in the past. Just ask Mr. Bates.

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SEAHAWKS.NET. We All We Got, We All We Need

I'm not really worried about the playcalls so much as the the type of call. We base most of our passing game off of the threat of the run. Even if the run game isn't working, sticking with it will keep defenses honest, and give our WRs an easier time getting separation. And, like stated above, this was the first time we didn't start to maul a defense in the 4th quarter. Every defense, even SF's started to wilt under our rush attack in the 4th.

My problem with the run calls were that we ran right at the strength of the Dolphin's defense, who are 2 DT's that go 355 lbs, and 305 lbs. Instead of running right at them, why not run off Tackle ? Get the big guys running sideline to sideline. If you can't wear them out going right at them, make the fat asses run. Hell, it works against us. I also would've liked to see us run a lot of 2 TE sets, where we run out of one set, then pass out of the same formation. Also, quicken the tempo so they can't get their big guys off the field. Do this at the beginning of the game, make those guys play more snaps than they like to, and get them in personnel groupings they don't want to be in. This was something I did mention before we played the game as well. We've been hearing about our awesome 2 TE sets since we had Miller and Carlson, but I haven't seen it all that much.

Miami also got us that way a lot. You saw a lot of plass plays with Mebane, Branch, and Bryant in there, with only Clemmons getting any sort of pass rush. This is one reason our pass rush suffered, and why our big guys wore down. I know we play a ball control offense, but I'd really like to see us mix it up a bit with some uptempo stuff, ala the Patriots.

The beginning was worse

The throw to lynch on the screen was a rookie mistake...decent gall, bad execution. We would still have been ok for another play after that if not 3rd an forever

I don't blame the offense much in this game. The defense allowed long drives to end the game that absolutely killed us.

Leon gave us the lead, then we gave it right back. They went head to head with us and beat our defense down when it mattered. This was not a great offense we yielded 180 plus yards on the ground to.

That is the troubling issue.

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Truth.

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SEAHAWKS.NET. We All We Got, We All We Need

Please check your stats. They ran 56 actual plays: passed it 27 times and ran it 27 times. I don't get how you arrived at 60%. Russ Wilson was sacked twice and and scrambled a few times but the option plays that were obvious run plays. We had more than 21 run plays and fewer than 32 pass plays that you stated we had.

I have not re-watched the game, so this is just a feeling, maybe the X & O watchers can confirm or disconfirm. It felt like we threw an overabundance of passes near or behind the line of scrimmage. It seemed those bubble screens and read-options worked in games previously because they were change-of-pace and targeted specific weaknesses or tendencies of the defenses we were facing. In the Dolphin game it felt like we were trying to force those because they had 'become part of our offense' and worked previously. It's possible I came away with this impression just because they didn't work at crucial moments, I dunno. Any evidence either way on this?

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Lynch ran 19 times and Turbin ran it 2, and rice 1.Wilson dropped back 34 times passing 27 , running 5 times and 2 sacks.Lets say 32 pass plays.I will give you 2 options that i dont remember.That is somewhere around .5714285714% of the 56 plays called...almost 60%

Yea it's easy to take the 5 Wilson 'run' plays and assume they were qb scrambles on passing plays--just not the case. Lynch+Turbin's+Rice's carries > 21 runs you stated earlier. And that's nowhere near the 60/40% ratio you seem to think we had.