Hurtt will be only major firing

[morgulon1]

The Seahawks I saw against Pittsburgh looked like a team who have lost their fight. I think Seattle has players that could flourish under a different coach in a different system.

Surely Paul Allen's sister isn't blind to Pete Carroll's dementia .

Purgatory is being too nice.

 

[Maelstrom787]

Hurtt is the most crucial firing, but Pete needs to wholesale wipe the staff at a 2017 (preferably further than 2017) level as a non-negotiable condition of allowing him to continue until his oncoming retirement.

Pete has a say in the direction of both the offensive and defensive units, but all available information suggests that he leaves implementation of the concepts to the coordinators and other assistants. We've got guys who don't know how to fit the goddamn run right now on defense, and that is an unacceptable condition for an NFL defense to remain in for any extended period of time. This comes down to implementation of scheme and the effective development of players, and Hurtt just is not doing that. He's either overwhelmed or ineffective, or both.

Waldron is less egregious, but he's also too cute and also doesn't really appear to have much talent for cleanly implementating his own concepts.

This is the risk you take when hiring two separate first-time coordinators instead of steady veterans. We need experienced professionals who have been down this road before, and desperately so.

The defense is giving up. I don't think it's an intrinsic motivation issue so much as it's an issue of knowing that they're operating in chaos. You cannot play fast if you're confused, and you cannot play fast if you've got no trust in the guys next to you to maintain their goddamn gaps. This is the minimum responsibility of a defender.

 

[DarkVictory23]

For the folks who say they changed the scheme...

If you want to get mired in technical minutia, it is mostly true. But really more like window dressing, or fake marketing.

Philosophically, it remains the same. That is why Pete signed off on it in the first place.

Rush 4, play soft zone behind it.

Whether it be cover 2, cover 3, quarters, or quarter-quarter-half.

Soft zone is what is repeatedly run.

They are built to play a different way.

Stacked fronts, and bring pressure from everywhere with their unique talents they have in the secondary, who also are at their best in man defense. 5 of 6 Woolen INTs last year came in man coverage. He is not a soft zone corner. Neither is Witherspoon.

Stop defending this horrible defensive head coach, and his crony coaching staff for the love of God.

They are dysfunctional, underachieving, taking plays off, and disinterested with the playoffs on the line. Tells you all you need to know.

The folks who say they changed the scheme, it's not 'mostly true' on a 'minutia' level, it's just 'mostly true'.

And part of what is hard to take seriously about some of this 'analysis' about what's wrong now is the number of people here who were insistent, INSISTENT!, that Ken Norton was the worst defensive coordinator of all-time, that our defense the last season with Russ was the WORST, MOST TERRIBLE, NO GOOD defense of all-time.

What was the reality? We were an average to good defense who basically operated with a bend-but-don't-break philosophy. If we were just holding them to the bend-but-don't-break philosophy, they weren't kind of good, they were just good.

Number 5 in the red zone, number 3 on 4th down, top 10 in points given up, opp. scoring percentage, and points per opp. drive. Number 2 on yard per rush attempt!

So why in the world were so many people convinced they were bad? Because we had to have an anti-Pete narrative to explain why our team didn't make the playoffs that year and focusing on the obvious problem (Russ was a 3 and out machine) put the blame somewhere that didn't fit the narrative.

This was the quintessential Pete Carroll defense. It had a weakness (soft against intermediate depth passing), but designed to not give up easy rush yards or big passing plays and once a team no longer has that intermediate space, they became one of the stingiest in the league. The thing that was missing is we simply didn't have the impact players to get us takeaways that Pete loves. But our gameplan worked with what we had.

That is not what we have now. This is NOT the same problems we had then. We actually have impact guys like Love and Witherspoon who are capable of creating turnovers, but we are soft against the run and generating TO's is now what we do to stop big passing plays instead of just not letting that work. It's got some of the same ideas of Pete's other defenses but that's only because every defensive system has some overlap and if you are comparing zone to zone schemes, the overlap naturally becomes greater.

All those numbers where we used to be top 10 or better, we are bottom 10 on basically all of them and have been since last season. This was an IMMEDIATE reversion. It's fun to say 'players have given up on Pete' or 'these guys don't respect Pete' (especially when we ourselves don't like Pete), but these are the same guys who just went out and ended both the previous two games on big defensive plays.

The problem is we have a bad system and due to injuries and other personnel issues, we are fundamentally undersized when faced with a bullying running game.

 

[Bear-Hawk]

The folks who say they changed the scheme, it's not 'mostly true' on a 'minutia' level, it's just 'mostly true'.

And part of what is hard to take seriously about some of this 'analysis' about what's wrong now is the number of people here who were insistent, INSISTENT!, that Ken Norton was the worst defensive coordinator of all-time, that our defense the last season with Russ was the WORST, MOST TERRIBLE, NO GOOD defense of all-time.

What was the reality? We were an average to good defense who basically operated with a bend-but-don't-break philosophy. If we were just holding them to the bend-but-don't-break philosophy, they weren't kind of good, they were just good.

Number 5 in the red zone, number 3 on 4th down, top 10 in points given up, opp. scoring percentage, and points per opp. drive. Number 2 on yard per rush attempt!

So why in the world were so many people convinced they were bad? Because we had to have an anti-Pete narrative to explain why our team didn't make the playoffs that year and focusing on the obvious problem (Russ was a 3 and out machine) put the blame somewhere that didn't fit the narrative.

This was the quintessential Pete Carroll defense. It had a weakness (soft against intermediate depth passing), but designed to not give up easy rush yards or big passing plays and once a team no longer has that intermediate space, they became one of the stingiest in the league. The thing that was missing is we simply didn't have the impact players to get us takeaways that Pete loves. But our gameplan worked with what we had.

That is not what we have now. This is NOT the same problems we had then. We actually have impact guys like Love and Witherspoon who are capable of creating turnovers, but we are soft against the run and generating TO's is now what we do to stop big passing plays instead of just not letting that work. It's got some of the same ideas of Pete's other defenses but that's only because every defensive system has some overlap and if you are comparing zone to zone schemes, the overlap naturally becomes greater.

All those numbers where we used to be top 10 or better, we are bottom 10 on basically all of them and have been since last season. This was an IMMEDIATE reversion. It's fun to say 'players have given up on Pete' or 'these guys don't respect Pete' (especially when we ourselves don't like Pete), but these are the same guys who just went out and ended both the previous two games on big defensive plays.

The problem is we have a bad system and due to injuries and other personnel issues, we are fundamentally undersized when faced with a bullying running game.

This is fixable with an inmovable nose tackle (or 2). Bears brought in Billings and went from worst to first against the run. It’s been amazing.

 

[Ozzy]

I still find it baffling people paint a picture of Pete sitting in an office and being completely hands off to remove blame. Do we think he’s just high fiving guys and handing out water? He’s in every game plan meeting, he’s at every practice, he hears most of the calls in the headset etc and yet the defense has been really bad for years now even after they threw a ton of resources at it. If it was just a one year or two year thing then I could see a situation where the coach isn’t largely at fault and it’s the DC but this has gone on far too long for it to not be heavily a Pete problem. Fandom keeps people from seeing the obvious.

 

[DarkVictory23]

I still find it baffling people paint a picture of Pete sitting in an office and being completely hands off to remove blame. Do we think he’s just high fiving guys and handing out water? He’s in every game plan meeting, he’s at every practice, he hears most of the calls in the headset etc and yet the defense has been really bad for years now even after they threw a ton of resources at it. If it was just a one year or two year thing then I could see a situation where the coach isn’t largely at fault and it’s the DC but this has gone on far too long for it to not be heavily a Pete problem. Fandom keeps people from seeing the obvious.

But I just pointed out that our defense was good just two seasons ago. This has nothing to do with thinking Pete is sitting hands off in an office. I don't give him a free pass for our current issues.

The problem is that most of this discussion is based on a fundamentally flawed premise that where we are now, the problems we have now, are the same as problems we had in the past. We don't even have the same problems on one side of the ball, let alone as a whole team.

Two years ago, our biggest problem was an offense that could not stay on the field. This problem was fundamentally caused by our franchise, highly paid QB.

I think what's emblematic of the problem is illustrated by this: How many of the people who were CERTAIN that after we moved on from Russ that we would be an absolute joke--2 wins, 4 tops--are the same ones that are sure we underperformed by not getting further in the playoffs last year?

 

[Maelstrom787]

I still find it baffling people paint a picture of Pete sitting in an office and being completely hands off to remove blame. Do we think he’s just high fiving guys and handing out water? He’s in every game plan meeting, he’s at every practice, he hears most of the calls in the headset etc and yet the defense has been really bad for years now even after they threw a ton of resources at it. If it was just a one year or two year thing then I could see a situation where the coach isn’t largely at fault and it’s the DC but this has gone on far too long for it to not be heavily a Pete problem. Fandom keeps people from seeing the obvious.

Who is doing what you're accusing them of doing here?

You're accusing people of essentially purposeful delusion, but I don't see anyone here making the claim that Pete is entirely hands-off. Especially considering the large majority of the board wants the guy fired.

If you're referring to people like me who are labeled mindless Carroll groupies, then yes, I put a ton of the blame on Hurtt. He's a ridiculously bad coordinator. Coordinators have the responsibility of implementing the finer details of the vision and scheme philosophy set by the head coach - this is true of most teams, and it's true here. There are obviously portions of this where Pete is hands-on, but the current brand of defensive issues are unique to Hurtt's tenure. The level of confusion, the refusal to execute run fits properly, that's all coordinator stuff. Those are finer details of implementing the actual defensive product. That is a failure to provide acceptable tutelage.

Pete gets the blame for hiring him, and he especially gets the blame for not pulling the plug on Hurtt after an emasculating 2022. Carroll teams have never not been able to defend the run well through simple gap control and execution, except for the exact moment Hurtt took over and we shifted philosophy. We've even reverted many of those changes scheme-wise, but the poor chemistry and rampant busts continue.

I would attribute scheme issues on defense to Carroll. I attribute the lack of ability to play assignment-sound football on defense to Hurtt and the positional assistants. That doesn't mean that Pete's hands-off, I'd never claim that explicitly because that just is not true. It just means that the newer issues are all things that can be pretty squarely pointed towards Hurtt not being an NFL quality coordinator, which was obvious last year and should've been summarily rectified this offseason.

The things that I'm more pissed about ARE one/two year things. A lack of overall defensive success has been a common thread, but this level of ineptitude (especially regarding the fully and utterly broken run D) is unique to Hurtt's tenure. Blaming Hurtt for a lot of the biggest defensive issues isn't the same as absolving Pete of his culpability for allowing this mess to become a tempestuous typhoon of rancid diarrhea.

 

[knownone]

I don't think Hurt is a good coach. But It's hard for me to place the blame solely at his feet. He's coaching a reasonably talented unit without the pieces required to showcase that talent. Which is to say, if we're relying on Diggs, Woolen, Witherspoon, and Brown to tackle running backs in the open field because the front seven can't stop anyone, all of that coverage and pass rush talent on defense is wasted.

The biggest issue from my vantage point is less about coaching, which is undoubtedly an issue—don't get me wrong—and more about personnel decisions.

Without Brooks and Nwosu, the Seahawk's front seven is pretty bad top-to-bottom. Reed and Jones were rotational-level linemen outside of Seattle; neither was particularly good against the run, and that's how they are performing this season. Luckily, the Jones contract is more of a prove-it deal, so they're not tied to him long-term. Taylor, Bush, and Hall have been downright terrible. Mafe, Wagner, and Williams were the only average starters on the front seven against Pittsburgh, and Bobby is a flawed player at this point in his career.

Unfortunately, just like last season, Seattle desperately needs another good young LB and a difference-maker up front. And while many in Seahawksdom gave me crap the previous year for suggesting they trade a second for Roquan Smith at the deadline and draft Jalen Carter, it seems pretty obvious they could use those types of guys now instead of investing in their already reasonably deep secondary and RB rooms. But I digress.

To me, the Seahawks gambled on Reed and Jones being starters, weren't sufficiently prepared to lose Nwosu and Brooks for stretches, and suffered through a brutal offensive schedule. That's not all on Hurt. It's on Pete and John as well. And we shouldn't blame coaches when guys who've never been good at tackling are still bad at tackling.

 

[Ozzy]

Who is doing what you're accusing them of doing here?

You're accusing people of essentially purposeful delusion, but I don't see anyone here making the claim that Pete is entirely hands-off. Especially considering the large majority of the board wants the guy fired.

If you're referring to people like me who are labeled mindless Carroll groupies, then yes, I put a ton of the blame on Hurtt. He's a ridiculously bad coordinator. Coordinators have the responsibility of implementing the finer details of the vision and scheme philosophy set by the head coach - this is true of most teams, and it's true here. There are obviously portions of this where Pete is hands-on, but the current brand of defensive issues are unique to Hurtt's tenure. The level of confusion, the refusal to execute run fits properly, that's all coordinator stuff. Those are finer details of implementing the actual defensive product. That is a failure to provide acceptable tutelage.

Pete gets the blame for hiring him, and he especially gets the blame for not pulling the plug on Hurtt after an emasculating 2022. Carroll teams have never not been able to defend the run well through simple gap control and execution, except for the exact moment Hurtt took over and we shifted philosophy. We've even reverted many of those changes scheme-wise, but the poor chemistry and rampant busts continue.

I would attribute scheme issues on defense to Carroll. I attribute the lack of ability to play assignment-sound football on defense to Hurtt and the positional assistants. That doesn't mean that Pete's hands-off, I'd never claim that explicitly because that just is not true. It just means that the newer issues are all things that can be pretty squarely pointed towards Hurtt not being an NFL quality coordinator, which was obvious last year and should've been summarily rectified this offseason.

The things that I'm more pissed about ARE one/two year things. A lack of overall defensive success has been a common thread, but this level of ineptitude (especially regarding the fully and utterly broken run D) is unique to Hurtt's tenure. Blaming Hurtt for a lot of the biggest defensive issues isn't the same as absolving Pete of his culpability for allowing this mess to become a tempestuous typhoon of rancid diarrhea.

I was speaking in generalities and wasn't aiming it at you or anyone. Multiple people have made the argument none of this is Pete's fault but its almost solely Clints fault.

My point is its almost impossible to not view this at a minimum at 50/50 situation with Hurt/Pete and I think that's being generous. Pete is the one in charge of the whole thing, Pete is is the CEO and works along side John in player acquisition and is the one guy who has a hand in every piece of this equation. There are posts daily who are calling people being critical of Pete has lesser fans because "he's a winner!" .

This defense has been bad for years now and even after Pete got guys he wanted its bottom of the league bad. The past two years we are 32nd in EPA on defense. Blame Clint, Pete or whoever but for me I don't see the rationale for isolating one of them when its both.

 

[Ozzy]

I don't think Hurt is a good coach. But It's hard for me to place the blame solely at his feet. He's coaching a reasonably talented unit without the pieces required to showcase that talent. Which is to say, if we're relying on Diggs, Woolen, Witherspoon, and Brown to tackle running backs in the open field because the front seven can't stop anyone, all of that coverage and pass rush talent on defense is wasted.

The biggest issue from my vantage point is less about coaching, which is undoubtedly an issue—don't get me wrong—and more about personnel decisions.

Without Brooks and Nwosu, the Seahawk's front seven is pretty bad top-to-bottom. Reed and Jones were rotational-level linemen outside of Seattle; neither was particularly good against the run, and that's how they are performing this season. Luckily, the Jones contract is more of a prove-it deal, so they're not tied to him long-term. Taylor, Bush, and Hall have been downright terrible. Mafe, Wagner, and Williams were the only average starters on the front seven against Pittsburgh, and Bobby is a flawed player at this point in his career.

Unfortunately, just like last season, Seattle desperately needs another good young LB and a difference-maker up front. And while many in Seahawksdom gave me crap the previous year for suggesting they trade a second for Roquan Smith at the deadline and draft Jalen Carter, it seems pretty obvious they could use those types of guys now instead of investing in their already reasonably deep secondary and RB rooms. But I digress.

To me, the Seahawks gambled on Reed and Jones being starters, weren't sufficiently prepared to lose Nwosu and Brooks for stretches, and suffered through a brutal offensive schedule. That's not all on Hurt. It's on Pete and John as well. And we shouldn't blame coaches when guys who've never been good at tackling are still bad at tackling.

I'm not fan of Clint but its hard to argue with this. Good post.

 

[scutterhawk]

We're in limbo until Allen sells the team. The new owner will come in wanting to make a big splash, and things will be fun again. It won't always work out, but at least there will be hope. That's the only path to escape the mediocrity treadmill we're on.

You mean like the "Big Splash" that Walmart made with the Bronco/Wilson Mega Contract? LOLOLOLOL
Things COULD be much no, MUCH worse, I've never been a big fan of just throwing everything in the crapper, THINKING that it will only be bad for a little while, and then will M-A-Y-B-E get better sometime in the future.
Pete getting the Seahawks into the playoffs more than 80% of his time here is an outstanding FEAT, Care to guess how many teams have won the Super Bowl having NOT made the playoffs?
Oh I know, I hear the sniveling & crying about the "One And Done", how about the crapload of teams who are CONSISTENTLY MISSING the Playoffs altogether?
The Seahawks back in the day were AMONG the most prolific @ 'Go Nowhere' teams.

 

[Maelstrom787]

I don't think Hurt is a good coach. But It's hard for me to place the blame solely at his feet. He's coaching a reasonably talented unit without the pieces required to showcase that talent. Which is to say, if we're relying on Diggs, Woolen, Witherspoon, and Brown to tackle running backs in the open field because the front seven can't stop anyone, all of that coverage and pass rush talent on defense is wasted.

The biggest issue from my vantage point is less about coaching, which is undoubtedly an issue—don't get me wrong—and more about personnel decisions.

Without Brooks and Nwosu, the Seahawk's front seven is pretty bad top-to-bottom. Reed and Jones were rotational-level linemen outside of Seattle; neither was particularly good against the run, and that's how they are performing this season. Luckily, the Jones contract is more of a prove-it deal, so they're not tied to him long-term. Taylor, Bush, and Hall have been downright terrible. Mafe, Wagner, and Williams were the only average starters on the front seven against Pittsburgh, and Bobby is a flawed player at this point in his career.

Unfortunately, just like last season, Seattle desperately needs another good young LB and a difference-maker up front. And while many in Seahawksdom gave me crap the previous year for suggesting they trade a second for Roquan Smith at the deadline and draft Jalen Carter, it seems pretty obvious they could use those types of guys now instead of investing in their already reasonably deep secondary and RB rooms. But I digress.

To me, the Seahawks gambled on Reed and Jones being starters, weren't sufficiently prepared to lose Nwosu and Brooks for stretches, and suffered through a brutal offensive schedule. That's not all on Hurt. It's on Pete and John as well. And we shouldn't blame coaches when guys who've never been good at tackling are still bad at tackling.

Reed has been mostly good, though! That's the thing that gets me. He's been penetrative, stout, and very much looks like vintage Jarran. Mario Edwards has also played well individually, and Williams is a bona fide wrecking ball. Dre'Mont is also a proven talent that we paid market value for. They can, and should, play better than "bar none the worst in the league currently."

I don't think talent can fix this. It can hide certain parts of it, but this is systemic. The tackling issues and all that sort of thing aren't explicitly coachable, but getting these guys to play with basic integrity is, and that portion of our play is just eroding further and further into an irretrievable mess.

We're shoveling legitimate talent onto that line, and the returns keep getting worse and worse. That isn't just players instantly forgetting how to play - its a failure of the defensive coaching staff not displaying the capability to impart a mastery of our relatively simple defensive concepts to these players. There are about 18 defenses out there with less raw talent on the line yet they're able to do more with it.

No one should expect a top defense with our weakness at linebacker and our tackling issues in the secondary, but I cannot find a way to defend Clint ending the year with another rapidly declining unit that can't operate on a basic level.

If the issues are effort related with certain players, that needs to be handled on a personnel level. The fits are still a constant issue. No plays where everyone seems to just do their job.

 

[Jac]

You mean like the "Big Splash" that Walmart made with the Bronco/Wilson Mega Contract? LOLOLOLOL
Things COULD be much no, MUCH worse, I've never been a big fan of just throwing everything in the crapper, THINKING that it will only be bad for a little while, and then will M-A-Y-B-E get better sometime in the future.
Pete getting the Seahawks into the playoffs more than 80% of his time here is an outstanding FEAT, Care to guess how many teams have won the Super Bowl having NOT made the playoffs?
Oh I know, I hear the sniveling & crying about the "One And Done", how about the crapload of teams who are CONSISTENTLY MISSING the Playoffs altogether?
The Seahawks back in the day were AMONG the most prolific @ 'Go Nowhere' teams.

So you think Carroll is the head coach who is going to turn this team into a legitimate playoff threat?

 

[scutterhawk]

So you think Carroll is the head coach who is going to turn this team into a legitimate playoff threat?

So I think that with the RIGHT Player acquisitions, better DC & a more imaginative OC, we could do a lot BETTER.
Pete absolutely HAS HAD the right combo of Players/DC's/OC's, and has had top of the line success because of it.
You don't throw the baby out with the mucky bathwater.

 

[James in PA]

So I think that with the RIGHT Player acquisitions, better DC & a more imaginative OC, we could do a lot BETTER.
Pete absolutely HAS HAD the right combo of Players/DC's/OC's, and has had top of the line success because of it.
You don't throw the baby out with the mucky bathwater.

The baby is now an adult!

 

[hoxrox]

So I think that with the RIGHT Player acquisitions, better DC & a more imaginative OC, we could do a lot BETTER.
Pete absolutely HAS HAD the right combo of Players/DC's/OC's, and has had top of the line success because of it.
You don't throw the baby out with the mucky bathwater.

I have no confidence that he will hire anyone competent. In fact, he will probably "run it back" thinking that he can still coach up and develop these hirelings, when he should have just hired competent coordinators in the first place.

 

[James in PA]

Since DQ, we actually get worse with each defensive coordinator change. Our head coach is supposed to know about defense. I've never seen anything like this. It would be like Andy Reid having a 23rd or lower ranked offense for 6 years straight.

 

[Maelstrom787]

Since DQ, we actually get worse with each defensive coordinator change. Our head coach is supposed to know about defense. I've never seen anything like this. It would be like Andy Reid having a 23rd or lower ranked offense for 6 years straight.

If Pete were actually coaching the defense instead of sticking to his head coaching philosophy (he just sets vision and scheme, coordinators coach the actual details and minutiae within that framework) I'm sure they'd be at least average. He gives too much leeway on defense for coordinators to bone things up like Hurtt has. They'd be at least KNJ-era level (probably slightly better) if he were interested in actually taking over the unit imo.

 

[Bear-Hawk]

I was speaking in generalities and wasn't aiming it at you or anyone. Multiple people have made the argument none of this is Pete's fault but its almost solely Clints fault.

My point is its almost impossible to not view this at a minimum at 50/50 situation with Hurt/Pete and I think that's being generous. Pete is the one in charge of the whole thing, Pete is is the CEO and works along side John in player acquisition and is the one guy who has a hand in every piece of this equation. There are posts daily who are calling people being critical of Pete has lesser fans because "he's a winner!" .

This defense has been bad for years now and even after Pete got guys he wanted its bottom of the league bad. The past two years we are 32nd in EPA on defense. Blame Clint, Pete or whoever but for me I don't see the rationale for isolating one of them when its both.

We have the same issue with the Bears. The offensive coordinator is horrible. Ultimately, it is the responsibility of the coach to do something about it. If he doesn’t act, the responsibility falls on the GM. I see the Seahawks in the same situation. This team needs more players AND a different defensive scheme.

 

[pittpnthrs]

All those numbers where we used to be top 10 or better, we are bottom 10 on basically all of them and have been since last season. This was an IMMEDIATE reversion. It's fun to say 'players have given up on Pete' or 'these guys don't respect Pete' (especially when we ourselves don't like Pete), but these are the same guys who just went out and ended both the previous two games on big defensive plays.

The problem is we have a bad system and due to injuries and other personnel issues, we are fundamentally undersized when faced with a bullying running game.

There's actual game footage of Diggs, Woolen, and Adams just standing around during plays. They gave up. Why? Because they are set up for failure. Bad system indeed. It's so bad, its laughable.