oldhawkfan
Well-known member
Whoever it is that has said "winning fixes everything", or something like that, sure weren't kidding. I think most Seahawks fans feel way better about this team today than the last couple of weeks.
It got me to thinking about the lack of offseason, limited training camp, no preseason games, new players, injuries, etc. Its been fairly obvious, at least to me that Pete Carroll goes into each season, tweaking the roster, scheme and game plans not only during preseason games, but also the first 4-5ish games of the regular season.
Its got me to wondering how much of the defensive woes have been partly on this philosophy of creating a winning team that is hopefully hitting its stride at the end of the season heading into the playoffs. Some of the obvious crap play by the defense has been talked about by "the experts" and fans as mistakes that are fixable. Easily, half of the defense is young and/or new to the team. Learning the defense takes a bit of time and without offseason programs and preseason, the learning curve is much steeper. The only doubt I have about this is that almost always, defenses are ahead of offenses because early on they can get away with mostly reacting to the offense and working at shutting them down. This year has been weird in so many ways.
After last nights game and the 2nd half of last weeks game, the defense looks to be playing better. Maybe they are trusting each other more. Maybe they are trusting the system more. Maybe we are starting to see and will continue to see a defense that is finally playing together and is living up to the defense we all thought they could be on paper.
Lots of ifs involved to go from the historically bad defense we saw the first 7-8 games to a somewhat competent middle of the road defense. Trusting your team mates is a huge part of football. There have been a lot of guys in and out of the lineup because of injuries. Seems kind of hard to trust the guys around you when they are changing as much as they have and you didn't have an offseason to acclimate.
Historically Pete's Seahawks teams have started to hit their stride the last half of the year. That stride may just have had a steeper path this year than years past.
It got me to thinking about the lack of offseason, limited training camp, no preseason games, new players, injuries, etc. Its been fairly obvious, at least to me that Pete Carroll goes into each season, tweaking the roster, scheme and game plans not only during preseason games, but also the first 4-5ish games of the regular season.
Its got me to wondering how much of the defensive woes have been partly on this philosophy of creating a winning team that is hopefully hitting its stride at the end of the season heading into the playoffs. Some of the obvious crap play by the defense has been talked about by "the experts" and fans as mistakes that are fixable. Easily, half of the defense is young and/or new to the team. Learning the defense takes a bit of time and without offseason programs and preseason, the learning curve is much steeper. The only doubt I have about this is that almost always, defenses are ahead of offenses because early on they can get away with mostly reacting to the offense and working at shutting them down. This year has been weird in so many ways.
After last nights game and the 2nd half of last weeks game, the defense looks to be playing better. Maybe they are trusting each other more. Maybe they are trusting the system more. Maybe we are starting to see and will continue to see a defense that is finally playing together and is living up to the defense we all thought they could be on paper.
Lots of ifs involved to go from the historically bad defense we saw the first 7-8 games to a somewhat competent middle of the road defense. Trusting your team mates is a huge part of football. There have been a lot of guys in and out of the lineup because of injuries. Seems kind of hard to trust the guys around you when they are changing as much as they have and you didn't have an offseason to acclimate.
Historically Pete's Seahawks teams have started to hit their stride the last half of the year. That stride may just have had a steeper path this year than years past.
