A glaring stat from yesterday's loss (1 for 2)

[seabowl]

There are many reasons for yesterday's loss but IMO one of the biggest things that jumped out at me was Russell having 1 rush for 2 yards TOTAL. We have seen time and time again the read option being run beautifully with Russell holding onto the ball and taking off for big runs. We have also seen him get out of some jams for large chunks of yards. Many of these big runs have come on the road over the last 2 years. Yesterday we saw none of that. We did not sustain enough drives hence the Niners having the ball for 28% more plays than the Hawks. Russell is a master with the ball whether he is throwing or running and I wish we could have used his abilities better on the ground than just 1 rush for 2 yards. Quite possibly the outcome would have been different.

 

[onanygivensunday]

SF played a helluva game.... particularly on defense.

Let's just give them the credit they are due.

 

[EverydayImRusselin]

I thought it seemed like they had told him not to keep the ball on any of those reads. There were quite a few where it seemed he had huge holes on his side to pick up 10+ yds easily. I think maybe the coaches were just telling him to be conservative and not take any big hits. Reminded me of the preseason reads.

 

[daketah]

The Seahawks have a great rushing attack without risking injury to Russell.

 

[Hawknballs]

yeah I was all for not having put himself out there to get beat down by the only defense that's nearly as physical as ours.

 

[seabowl]

yeah I was all for not having put himself out there to get beat down by the only defense that's nearly as physical as ours.

From what i have seen from his is that he does not put himself in those positions. He's smart enough to know when to slide/go out of bounds. Not buying into the "coaches want to play it safe" argument. I think we wanted to win this game as much as any other.

 

[General Manager]

I think it's obvious that they made a conscious decision to hold him back in this regard.

 

[Wartooth]

TJack was sick or something?
They had a spy on Russell the whole game.
Go back and watch it, Bowman, or someone else was waiting to drill him if he took off.
And Bowman is known for his patented shot to the shoulder, so they land hard on the other shoulder move.
Glad they didn't run him into that.

 

[Hawks46]

Meh, I think we're fine at the skill positions.

Lynch and Turbin are very good at catching passes out of the backfield. If/when Harvin gets back, he's also in that mix near the LOS.

Tate is good down the field, in the slot, and great at screens. He's versatile and if we utilized him with a bit more variety, I think he would be even better.

Baldwin is one of the better slot WRs in the game. I think he's a bit overmatched on the outside, as evidenced by his dip in production once Rice is gone. Doug still gets his big plays, but that's usually to the defense being lulled to sleep when he hasn't been targetted all game, then there is a breakdown in coverage and Bang! Baldwin makes his prescence felt. Seriously though, he's not dominating on the outside.

Kearse is a guy that can and probably will get better. Consider this his rookie season in terms of reps. We can see the progression as the season goes along.

Lockette. Meh, he can be good and he can take the top off of the defense but he's never put it together. With the amount of time in the league, it's safe to assume he's at or around his ceiling.

Miller is a solid TE that is savvy and can break a zone. He's also probably the best blocking TE in the league. Going forward, he's not likely to be our big play guy there but as a dual "threat" TE, I can see us utilizing 2 TE sets with a lot more variety.

Luke Willson. You can see last game what the Hawks saw in him. He gets that ball and LBers aren't going to get him, and he can break CBs tackles. He's no where near his ceiling and will continue to get better. Once Wilson gets some confidence and chemistry with him, and he sees the field more, we're going to see Willson make more of an impact.

Harvin is Harvin. We all know his game breaking potential, but how much can we rely on him ? So far we haven't really needed him.

We have the weapons, I'm betting that if Wilson gets better at seeing the entire field (yes he can improve...it's scary but he hasn't hit his peak either) we'll have such variety it will be similar to a NO passing game with deeper PA strikes mixed in with a heavier run based offense.

IMO I'd rather have an OL in the 1st next year. Our OL is above average to good, but not very durable and we get blown up by elite competition.

 

[brimsalabim]

TJack was sick or something?
They had a spy on Russell the whole game.
Go back and watch it, Bowman, or someone else was waiting to drill him if he took off.
And Bowman is known for his patented shot to the shoulder, so they land hard on the other shoulder move.
Glad they didn't run him into that.

Our fault for not figuring out away to exploit the spy.

 

[hawksfansinceday1]

Meh, I think we're fine at the skill positions.

Lynch and Turbin are very good at catching passes out of the backfield. If/when Harvin gets back, he's also in that mix near the LOS.

Tate is good down the field, in the slot, and great at screens. He's versatile and if we utilized him with a bit more variety, I think he would be even better.

Baldwin is one of the better slot WRs in the game. I think he's a bit overmatched on the outside, as evidenced by his dip in production once Rice is gone. Doug still gets his big plays, but that's usually to the defense being lulled to sleep when he hasn't been targetted all game, then there is a breakdown in coverage and Bang! Baldwin makes his prescence felt. Seriously though, he's not dominating on the outside.

Kearse is a guy that can and probably will get better. Consider this his rookie season in terms of reps. We can see the progression as the season goes along.

Lockette. Meh, he can be good and he can take the top off of the defense but he's never put it together. With the amount of time in the league, it's safe to assume he's at or around his ceiling.

Miller is a solid TE that is savvy and can break a zone. He's also probably the best blocking TE in the league. Going forward, he's not likely to be our big play guy there but as a dual "threat" TE, I can see us utilizing 2 TE sets with a lot more variety.

Luke Willson. You can see last game what the Hawks saw in him. He gets that ball and LBers aren't going to get him, and he can break CBs tackles. He's no where near his ceiling and will continue to get better. Once Wilson gets some confidence and chemistry with him, and he sees the field more, we're going to see Willson make more of an impact.

Harvin is Harvin. We all know his game breaking potential, but how much can we rely on him ? So far we haven't really needed him.

We have the weapons, I'm betting that if Wilson gets better at seeing the entire field (yes he can improve...it's scary but he hasn't hit his peak either) we'll have such variety it will be similar to a NO passing game with deeper PA strikes mixed in with a heavier run based offense.

IMO I'd rather have an OL in the 1st next year. Our OL is above average to good, but not very durable and we get blown up by elite competition.

I agree with you as usual 46. Besides, a good WR can be had in round 2.

 

[Seahawkx]

The whole purpose of the read option to keep the defense guessing and hesitating so that the RB gets a better chance of a hole with lesser defenders.. It isnt meant for the qb to get long runs.. I think the 49ers realized that RW hasn't been given the green signal to keep it and they were just going for the Beast immediately without any hesitation.. There were clearly big openings for RW to keep it and run with it, but didn't.. I call this on Pete/Bevell. It wasn't a pretty game calling yesterday.

 

[mikeak]

49ers at the end of last season held back on the RO. They didn't want to showcase everything and then they unleashed it against GB.

I firmly believe that we practiced certain things against the 49ers yesterday and didn't show other things as we will play them again......

 

[seahawks08]

we were not efficient the way we normally are. If we were efficient, we would have had a higher score. They did a hell of a good job in not letting us take over the game from the get go. I credit their defense but I think the team learns from this and moves on fast.

 

[2_0_6]

SFplayed their best game of the year yesterday, while we played one of our worst.

yet we only lost by 2 points, had the lead with 6 minutes to go, and on their field. My glass is way more than half full after yesterday's loss.

 

[Uncle Si]

They had a spy on Russell the whole game.
Go back and watch it, Bowman, or someone else was waiting to drill him if he took off.

this...


he got nailed on that first 3rd down play. TV analysists started showing the spy in play.

smart by the 9ers... but also led to TEs being open

 

[CANHawk]

The whole purpose of the read option to keep the defense guessing and hesitating so that the RB gets a better chance of a hole with lesser defenders.. It isnt meant for the qb to get long runs.. I think the 49ers realized that RW hasn't been given the green signal to keep it and they were just going for the Beast immediately without any hesitation.. There were clearly big openings for RW to keep it and run with it, but didn't.. I call this on Pete/Bevell. It wasn't a pretty game calling yesterday.

Not that I ever really like to play the "blame the coordinator" card (with the exception being Gregg <yawn> Knapp) both teams really seemed to want to play a real "3 yards and a cloud of dust" type of game. They seemed to be happy exchanging kicks to the junk all afternoon. It was actually kind of boring. I don't really once recall jumping up and getting excited about anything our offense did.

I suppose it would have worked in our favor (barely) if not for Gore breaking loose for that big gain, but that's no way to call a game IMO. We were winning, but it wasn't really working. They needed to dial something up, but never really did. Marshawn was slugging it out for not all that many ypc an as somebody else said, Russell had a chaperone all game. Would have liked to seen something whipped up to take advantage of those circumstances but... meh. What can ya do...

On to next week. shooting for 1-0.

 

[Jazzhawk]

The bottom line is Wilson is a weapon that was underutilized yesterday. He should have run more, by design or by happenstance.

 

[HansGruber]

They held him back from running because SF was trying to hurt people and playing dirty. Pretty simple.

 

[NFSeahawks]

I think it's obvious that they made a conscious decision to hold him back in this regard.

I agree, it's not Russell Wilson like to ignore obvious yard gain.