This is honestly the first moment I've had to comment and/or truly reflect upon the game since it ended. I've not listened to or read any commentary, nor re-watched any game tape. So, my commentary here is pretty much still my raw, gut initial reactions/impressions based upon what I saw the first time around.
Big impressions regarding the game itself …
I hate to say it, but I think Howie Long and the Fox Crew’s Halftime comments were right on the money. They had the same initial impression that I had of the Seahawks. Hawk players may not admit to it, but it certainly seemed like the Seahawks came in to this game thinking it would be a cakewalk. It appeared to me that they looked at the Bucs 0-7 record … the fact that they were playing at the CLINK … and thought to themselves, “Eh, we’ve got this one in the bag.”
Conversely, the Bucs seemed to me to come in to this game thinking, “We’ve got nothing to lose. We’re playing the #1 team in the NFL – let’s show the rest of the nation that we don’t suck.” For those who have seen the movie For Love of the Game, it’s like Kevin Costner’s catcher’s comment, “Right now, we don’t stink anymore. In this moment, we’re the best team in baseball.” And man, the Bucs certainly played like that.
That 1st half seemed to me to be a real wake-up call to the Seahawk players that HEY, this is the NFL, where even the very worst team can rise up and bite you if you don’t bring you’re “A” game each and every Sunday.
• I’m with you Kearly in being extremely impressed with the run blocking and the run game of the Seahawks in general. I don’t know how many of you realized this … but the Tampa Bay Bucs (despite their record) are one of the best Run Defense teams in the league. The numbers they’ve amassed re: Run Defense are no fluke either because they put up the exact same kinds of numbers last year. Lavonte David is a guy that I’ve always loved as a player – if there was one guy off that Tampa Roster I’d love to have, it would be him (well, Derrell Revis and Vincent Jackson would be kinda nice as well). For the Hawks to manage 5.7 yards/carry and rack up 198 yards against THAT defense – very freaking impressive.
• Marshawn Lynch was a real difference maker in this game. Though he didn’t get in the end zone, he had some incredibly huge runs in clutch situations. In OT, he nearly single handedly carried the team to victory.
• Speaking of, how in the @%$&* do you drive down to the 3 Yard line and NOT go Beast Mode with 1st and Goal to go? Yeah Baldwin looked like he was open … but Tandy read Wilson’s eyes/body language perfectly on that play for the pick. THAT could have been a real momentum killer. Thankfully, the Hawks defense quickly forced a 3 and out … and the offense was able to punch it in.
• Can’t say it enough, Doug Baldwin is the man. That sideline toe dragger in the 3rd Quarter – Largent couldn’t have done it any better.
• Golden Tate. What a playmaker. That 71 yard punt return was a thing of beauty and turned out to be a monumental momentum shifting play.
• The Run Defense was perhaps the most concerning thing to me of all in the 1st Half. How the heck do the Hawks allow Mike James to gain 158 yards and to average 5.6 yards/carry? It looked to me that the Bucs were gaining most of those yards straight up the middle, pushing our DT’s and sealing off Bobby Wagner with excellent downfield blocks. Once he was out of the way, there was very little to stop him from gaining big yards. It wasn’t only that though, as James had a lot of yards after contact. He was bowling Seahawk defenders over – pushing them straight back like a bulldozer. Shades of late last season were flashing in front of my eyes.
• Kudos to Mike Glennon. I’d figured that he would get swallowed up in this environment. Instead, he showed a great deal of poise and made a lot of big plays under fire. He looks like a real up and comer in this league. It looked to me as if Glennon was having a lot of success hitting those slots receivers on those short slants right over the middle, attacking the linebacking corps in coverage. Again, at times it looked similar to me to the problems that the Seahawks defense had last season in covering slot receivers. It was TE Timothy Wright and RB Brian Leonard who caused a lot of the damage in the passing game. Seattle has yet to find a solution to how to effectively defend those routes.
• To me, the Bucs Defense really got away with a bit of murder in this game. There were some late shots on Wilson that I thought frankly deserved a flag. Wilson took a bit of a beating in this game and I’m honestly hoping that we don’t hear of a fracture in his non-throwing hand or a concussion tomorrow. Major kudos to Wilson on that last 10 yards TD to Baldwin. He stood in there KNOWING he was going to take a shot … and delivered a strike. The good ones all make those kinds of throws and it was kind of nice to see.
• Lastly, I’d be curious to break out the stopwatch and see (on average) exactly how fast Russell Wilson actually got the ball out of hands. In the 1st Quarter of the Rams game (at the 8:51 Mark), Robert Quinn beat McQuistan on an inside move and sacks Wilson for a 10 yard loss. Lost in the shuffle of that play was the fact that Wilson held the ball for 3.62 seconds on that play by my watch. That was but one example of many such plays. In this game however, it sure seemed like to me as if Wilson was getting the ball out much quicker in this game. I’m curious to see if the data actually supports that.
