Official Seahawks vsCardinals Christmas Eve POST Game Thread

[Anthony]

So to sum up the state of the oline

Through 15 games in 2016 they have 144 hits and sacks or 9.6 per game and are allowing a hurry/pressure on 41.5% of the dropbacks to date that equals about 213 times for a total of 357
Through 16 games in 2015 they allowed 160 hits and sacks or 10 per game and allowed a hurry/pressure on 31.7% of his dropbacks that equals 153 times for a total of 313.

So with one game to go the 2016 line has allowed 357 hits, sacks, hurries/pressures while the 2015 oline for the season allowed 313 that's a difference of 44 and counting. Sorry this years oline is worse.

[HumanCockroach]

A'ight....

I simply do not care anymore. Blame them for RBs running into tacklers or getting 10 rushes a game despite having success when they do, blame them for Wilson holding the ball to long, leaving a clean pocket, and running into tacklers, blame them for offensive playcalling, and for receivers not getting open or running slow developing routes. Blame them for missed assignments from backs, and pressure on free blitzes where the D sends EIGHT OR SEVEN with five blockers. Ultimately, I simply do not care whether anyone wants to look deeper or not. Be my guest.

And by ALL means blame them for every ball in the dirt, behind them, ten yards over their head and every dumb, rookie interception thrown. While you're at it, blame them for Wilson getting stepped on, or dragged down from behind while running, blame them for every fumble a back or receiver has down the field, blame them for letting free rushers come clean do to horribly designed plays, and whatever you do, do NOT credit them when the offense clicks, allows Wilson hours to throw the ball, provides excellent blocking against top five rush defenses, or doesn't magically move to where Wilson decides he feels like scrambling to. Blame them every time Wilson refuses to step up into a clean pocket, and also when he bails out of one into a waiting tackler. Please, please, please blame them when Wilson hands the ball off instead of keeping it in read options with twenty yards of open ground in front of him, and make absolutely sure to call them garbage whenever you guys discuss players on teams with MORE sacks surrendered, hits, hurries and injuries to their QBs, God knows, there absolutely no other fans in the NFL dealing with a lack of success in their offensive lines.

[RiverDog]

RD so in essence you threw out the quality of the opponents, and averaged the sacks across the board? I'm not sure that's much of a solid barometer. Doesn't a team facing say ten of sixteen top ten pass rush teams in a season expect to have higher pressures, hits and sacks as opposed to one facing three or four?

I'm not claiming your "wrong" or anything, I'm pointing out how those numbers can drastically change depending on whether you add different criteria. Also be interesting to add in average time before release, number of releases vs throws etc.

It's far more complicated than a simple averaging of sack totals IMHO.

I do think Seattle LIKES the explosive plays, IE vertical passing, unfortunately, that INCREASES sacks, hits and pressure across the league. Just part of the package ( hence guys like Rodgers etc are almost always right at the top in those categories regardless of who is on the line, while QBs like Smith and Bridgewater are at the bottom).

Another important factor is ability to move, running success etc. Awfully difficult to avoid pressure when the QB can't effectively, or there's zero running game to keep the defense honest.

I'm not attacking your work, I just believe in a larger picture, as opposed to simply pointing at numbers and saying "see!".

Same reason I didn't feel Arizona was going to be some creampuffs last week. They are the number 3 defense, and the number 8 offense, if I was only looking at the wins and losses, I wouldn't have felt that way, but I look further, and always have, and probably always will.

Didn't I say that sack totals is not a perfect metric to gauge pass protection? Didn't I use the Arizona game to demonstrate the inadequacy of using sack totals to quantify pass protection?

The only reason I used it was because it was readily available and easy to enumerate game-by-game. I knew that one of the problems with comparing OL performance last year vs. this year was that there was a whole bunch of sacks in the first 7 games that skewed the total, so I wanted some way to factor out the "wow's" and give us a good game/bad game number to look at. I will admit that it doesn't 'prove' anything and falls into the category of supporting evidence.

[RiverDog]

So to sum up the state of the oline

Through 15 games in 2016 they have 144 hits and sacks or 9.6 per game and are allowing a hurry/pressure on 41.5% of the dropbacks to date that equals about 213 times for a total of 357
Through 16 games in 2015 they allowed 160 hits and sacks or 10 per game and allowed a hurry/pressure on 31.7% of his dropbacks that equals 153 times for a total of 313.

So with one game to go the 2016 line has allowed 357 hits, sacks, hurries/pressures while the 2015 oline for the season allowed 313 that's a difference of 44 and counting. Sorry this years oline is worse.

I'm not prepared to go that far and say that this OL is worse. As HC pointed out, there are a lot of other factors besides those you listed that has to be taken into consideration. For example, no one has addressed run blocking, no one has addressed penalties, no one has addressed 3rd down conversions, no one has addressed strength of schedule, and so on.

But what I will say is that at least to this point of the season, it is very apparent to me that this line is not significantly better than last season and may even be worse. It is important to note that we still have one regular season game and the playoffs to go before we can close the book on the 2016 season.

[HumanCockroach]

I'm done RD, blame them for everything, blame them for nothing, it no longer matters to me. I simply don't care. If people haven't seen improvement, nothing I say or do will change that opinion, because either they're to blinded by hero worship, or they have personal attachments to other players, or they simply are frustrated with the results and don't want to look at all the different reasons for those results, and it's convenient to just lay it all at the feet of those judged guilty before ever lining up for a snap ( amongst a multitude of other possible reasons).

I honestly am done wasting time attempting to explain my position. It ultimately comes back to I haven't a clue about football, and I'm "defending" the line, while "blaming" Wilson for everything. What's the point? That ISN'T what I've done, it ISN'T what I do moving forward, and it ISN'T worth my time to continue to attempt to explain it. No matter what view point I attempt to explain, it ultimately comes back to I'm wrong.

So on the line, I'm completely out. They are responsible for every single mistake made over the last five years. They are garbage, and despite all of them getting lucrative contracts and starting spots once they have left Seattle, they one and all, are absolute garbage and worthless, just like you all have been saying for the entirety of Carrolls time in Seattle. They bare ALL of the blame for every loss.

[RiverDog]

It ultimately comes back to I haven't a clue about football....

Now who said that? I, for one, have a huge amount of respect for you and your football prowess. I think you're getting a little thin skinned. We just happen to share a different opinion on this subject.

I'll have to apologize for rubbing your nose in the subject by using your "vastly improved" characterization every time one of our linemen so much as jumps offsides. But it's so rare that I ever get one up on you that I have to take advantage of the few opportunities you give me.

So please, chill out.

[HumanCockroach]

Whatever, it honestly doesn't matter to me. I don't care either way. It's all their fault, or some of their fault ( where I previously resided) or not their fault at all. I simply don't care. I'm tired of it, four years is enough, I'm done attempting to explain my position in regards to the line.

[NorthHawk]

What I see is this OL has a chance to be pretty good. Last year and the year prior it was on a downhill slide with not much to look at as a positive.
You build a line from the inside out and if they re-sign Britt at Center, I have hope they can be an asset to the Offense.
However, they have 2 things that are holding them back at the moment:
1) Lack of experience
2) Lack of playing time together

Most good OL's get there after being together for a couple of years and with today's CBA, there is very limited practice so the real meaningful time working together is during a game.
Fant might work out at LT, but it's been a disappointing effort at RT all year. Those two positions have to be better next year (I doubt they will improve this year).

What's really frustrating for me is they allowed the OL to degrade during a championship window. That was a big gamble and right now it doesn't look like it worked.

Edit:
Here's a link about OL blocking and some of the concerns. I found it interesting.
http://www.sbnation.com/2016/12/27/1406 ... ine-how-to

[Anthony]

What I see is this OL has a chance to be pretty good. Last year and the year prior it was on a downhill slide with not much to look at as a positive.
You build a line from the inside out and if they re-sign Britt at Center, I have hope they can be an asset to the Offense.
However, they have 2 things that are holding them back at the moment:
1) Lack of experience
2) Lack of playing time together

Most good OL's get there after being together for a couple of years and with today's CBA, there is very limited practice so the real meaningful time working together is during a game.
Fant might work out at LT, but it's been a disappointing effort at RT all year. Those two positions have to be better next year (I doubt they will improve this year).

What's really frustrating for me is they allowed the OL to degrade during a championship window. That was a big gamble and right now it doesn't look like it worked.

Edit:
Here's a link about OL blocking and some of the concerns. I found it interesting.
http://www.sbnation.com/2016/12/27/1406 ... ine-how-to

I am not debating whether they can become good or not, as I am not a fortune teller. However they are not good now. I do think they will need to do something about the tackles because they are really bad.

[NorthHawk]

If you go to
http://seahawksdraftblog.com
There are a few articles about the OL in general.
In one of them Dave Wyman is quoted about the run game.
Here's a quote that's interesting:

“I think more of it (the criticism) is 50/50 (between the running backs and O-line), if not even more for the running backs because, look, it doesn’t take that long to get… I mean if you have a guy that hits a spot at the right time, blocking someone can really be just getting in someone’s way or inhibiting them just a little bit. So it’s not always about crushing a guy off the line, it’s just about shielding him off. So I think some running backs have a much better sense of that than people think. This is just my prediction but I bet you if you listen to (Tom) Cable, that if you sat in those meetings… that there would be lots of talk about running backs not hitting the hole if you went back and looked at all the film this year. That that’s been more of the problem.”

If the run game is going to help the pass game, maybe the RB's have to get some of the blame. It's an interesting viewpoint.

[Anthony]

If you go to
http://seahawksdraftblog.com
There are a few articles about the OL in general.
In one of them Dave Wyman is quoted about the run game.
Here's a quote that's interesting:

“I think more of it (the criticism) is 50/50 (between the running backs and O-line), if not even more for the running backs because, look, it doesn’t take that long to get… I mean if you have a guy that hits a spot at the right time, blocking someone can really be just getting in someone’s way or inhibiting them just a little bit. So it’s not always about crushing a guy off the line, it’s just about shielding him off. So I think some running backs have a much better sense of that than people think. This is just my prediction but I bet you if you listen to (Tom) Cable, that if you sat in those meetings… that there would be lots of talk about running backs not hitting the hole if you went back and looked at all the film this year. That that’s been more of the problem.”

If the run game is going to help the pass game, maybe the RB's have to get some of the blame. It's an interesting viewpoint.

It is an interesting view point, there are others who have said the oline has been so bad there is nothing the RBs can do. for me it still goes back to the huge amount of times the RBs are hit in the back field. It sone thing to say they hit the wrong hole, or they missed something. But when you are hit in the backfiled that is on the online and that has happens a lot, or when there is no place to go at all. SO while I agree to a point, the problem is with this oline there is just way to many no holes, or hits in the backfield. I Mean great for Dave but if you look and read what most exerts say they say the oline is horrible. Even then lets remember run blocking is only half their job, and they suck at pass blocking. According to footballoutsiders.com we are 1 of only 3 teams to be ranked 25th or lower in both run and pass blocking. Thats says it all

[burrrton]

Yeah, I can totally buy that the RBs haven't been doing their part much of the time, either, but I don't remember ever being so repeatedly aggravated by D-linemen almost taking the damn handoff.

I referenced this earlier, but I read some stat about 'yards before contact' and we were the worst in the league by far, with something less than 1 being the number.

[Anthony]

Yeah, I can totally buy that the RBs haven't been doing their part much of the time, either, but I don't remember ever being so repeatedly aggravated by D-linemen almost taking the damn handoff.

I referenced this earlier, but I read some stat about 'yards before contact' and we were the worst in the league by far, with something less than 1 being the number.

1 yard before contact says alot about this olines ability or lack there of to run block