When you learn nationwide media retailers (ESPN, Bleacher Report, CBS Sports activities, amongst others), you’ll discover there’s not numerous widespread love or perception that the Seattle Seahawks will likely be as a lot as a playoff group this yr, overlook about competing for the NFC West. Even the betting traces have the Seahawks with a 7.5 win O/U.
I’ve no subject in any way with the reserved opinions in regards to the Seahawks and the predictions of no playoffs or perhaps a final place end within the NFC West. Whereas I personally consider Seattle will not less than make the postseason and have an excellent shot to win the division, I’m not such a homer that I can’t see the apparent paths to a non-winning season that don’t contain a slew of accidents.
The Geno Smith period has come and gone with the Seahawks posting profitable data each season, making the playoffs as soon as and shedding out on tiebreakers the opposite two instances.
I’m begging you to not view this as “Geno’s fault” or something like that, however there’s a motive why his tenure as Seahawks quarterback felt… a bit missing.
Or, to place it one other method: The Seahawks had been a +5 within the win column, had the purpose differential of a sub-.500 group, and the win energy of a paper tiger.
Again in December, following the loss to the Minnesota Vikings, I wrote this blurb that prolonged to the ultimate seasons of the Russell Wilson period:
Since 2020, the Seahawks are simply 3-17 towards eventual division champions (normally Tremendous Bowl contenders, with few exceptions). The .150 win proportion is an abysmal twenty eighth within the NFL. This consists of getting swept by the Rams in 2021, in addition to the 49ers in 2022 and 2023. A kind of “division champion” wins was the 7-9 Washington Soccer Workforce in 2020. This stat might really worsen in the event that they lose to the Rams once more and the Atlanta Falcons don’t win the NFC South.
In that very same timeframe, they’re tied for probably the most wins within the NFL towards groups under .400. That stat might fluctuate relying on whether or not or not the San Francisco 49ers lose out this season. And even then, greater than half of these wins had been by one possession.
Sure, I included the 2020 division champion Seahawks to not isolate virtually every thing completely to the Geno Smith period. Past another asterisks we might placed on that unprecedented coronavirus pandemic season, these Seahawks had been fairly rattling inflated. They had been a 12-4 group with a degree differential extra akin to a 10-6 squad regardless of enjoying the third best schedule in the complete NFL by opponent win proportion. Their solely sport towards a critical Tremendous Bowl contender that season was a whole humiliation towards the Buffalo Payments. In opposition to the one different playoff group they confronted with a profitable report, they went 1-2 versus the Rams and had been blown out within the playoffs.
As an replace, the Seahawks have the second-most wins towards sub-.400 groups and are nonetheless twenty eighth.
With regards to level differential, the Seahawks normally both play shut video games or acquired blown out. Since 2022, Seattle is backside ten in offensive possessions when main by 10+ factors. Wish to know the data of the opposite 9 groups throughout that span? It’s ugly.
The Seahawks haven’t led by greater than 21 factors in every of the final three years, one thing each different NFL group has achieved not less than as soon as. I don’t anticipate the Seahawks being a championship-caliber group this season, however I feel this line in Aaron Schatz’s 2025 FTN Soccer Almanac is correct.
Championship groups are usually outlined by their means to dominate inferior opponents, not their means to win shut video games.
Soccer video games are sometimes determined by only one or two performs: a missed discipline purpose, a bouncing fumble, the subjective spot of an official on fourth-and-1. One missed project by a cornerback or one barely askew move that bounces off a receiver’s fingers and into these of a defensive again 5 yards away and the sport may very well be over. In a blowout, nonetheless, one fortunate bounce isn’t going to vary issues. Championship groups—in each skilled and school soccer—sometimes beat their good opponents convincingly and destroy the cupcakes on the schedule.
Sure, whereas even the 2013 Seattle Seahawks wanted to rally from 21-0 all the way down to beat a horrid Tampa Bay Buccaneers group at residence, additionally they hammered the Jacksonville Jaguars and Atlanta Falcons by mixed scores of 78-27, blasted the San Francisco 49ers and New Orleans Saints by a mixed 63-10 over two residence video games, and edged previous the Carolina Panthers in a 12-7 gutty highway win. The best Seahawks group gained most of the time towards contenders and principally hammered inferior opposition. In recent times, Seattle has seldom proven itself to be demonstrably superior to bottom-dwellers and has been routinely hammered by the NFL’s elite. If you wish to add in context of the low expectations of the 2022 group and the teaching change in 2024, I don’t assume my level modifications a lot relating to the standard of the group, particularly once they’ve not executed a full-scale “blow all of it up” rebuild.
A number of weeks again, Rob Staton made this level on the HawksZone Rundown podcast that I principally (however don’t utterly) agree with:
“The opposite factor I’d like to see for them subsequent yr is simply win the video games you’re alleged to win. Don’t enable a group as unhealthy because the Giants to come back into your yard and outplay you and win that sport deservedly. Don’t enable that form of factor to occur. Don’t enable the Rams to come back to Seattle and escape with a victory in a sport it is best to have gained. Win these video games you’re alleged to win. We’ll forgive the Seahawks shedding highway video games towards high groups. You’ve simply acquired to win the video games you’re anticipated to win subsequent yr.”
Sure, Seattle shouldn’t let a dreadful New York Giants group win at Lumen Discipline. However that’s been a normal blip within the radar and even occurs to the very best groups. As famous earlier, the Seahawks haven’t had points defeating unhealthy groups, which for this train I’m defining as sub-.400 (aka 10+ losses), however they’ve not overwhelmed sufficient higher echelon opposition to be taken critically or advantage consideration as a contender.
We’re now two years faraway from Pete Carroll’s departure, and this offseason noticed two of the extra polarizing ‘#PetesGuys’ gamers (Geno Smith and DK Metcalf) traded to AFC groups. Overlook what the percentages say; a lot of you consider the Seahawks will win the NFC West and normally which means profitable not less than 10 video games. When you consider that the Seahawks upgraded their teaching workers and roster in totality within the short- and long-term, then presumably you again the Seahawks to make the playoffs this yr. When you don’t and settle for that an 8-9 “step again” season is feasible and never a failure, then the remainder of this text might be not meant for you!
With a full, correct offseason for Mike Macdonald, new coaches on offense, a protection that’s vastly improved from Pete’s closing years, a splashier free company than regular, and a extensively praised draft, it’s simple to be optimistic that the Seahawks are near being contenders as quickly as this yr. This isn’t a “rebuild to be good ultimately,” it’s a remaking of the roster to push for the playoffs after narrowly lacking out twice in a row.
If the Seahawks are on the cusp of greatness once more, then they should show it by doing issues nice or soon-to-be nice groups do. It hardly ever occurred within the Geno period and steadily stopped taking place throughout the finish of Wilson’s tenure. That is Seattle’s likelihood to show the critics mistaken and present that this isn’t a middling, principally innocent squad akin to the previous few seasons. If it doesn’t occur and it’s not due to a slew of accidents to key gamers, I might contemplate it a disappointment. But when these Seahawks are totally different, stay as much as their potential, and seem like a playoff risk that’s supposedly stacked with younger, principally battle-tested expertise? Then that’s worthy of respect and reward, and we’re in for thrilling instances forward.
And if the ’Hawks nonetheless don’t get their props from these nationwide retailers, columnists, podcasters, and speaking heads… then who offers a shit?
