RB Coach Smith on Lynch, Turbin and Christine Michael

Full Interview (great listen).

Transcription from Field Gulls:

On Lynch: "Marshawn is special. I've coached Eddie George, and I say that Eddie is the best player I've ever coached, but Marshawn is the most talented player I've ever coached. This guy can play anywhere. He could play linebacker, wide receiver. He's really good, he's special."

On Turbin: "Turbo's greatest ability, to me, and sometimes he's offended when I say this, is his dependability. He's going to go out there and do things right. He's going to do the right thing. I say this to our guys, it's not our job to win it, just don't lose it. If you go out there and do your thing, it gives us a chance. And Turbo does that. So, I'm still excited about Turbo, his dependability and the way he's playing physically, he's fine."

Is Turbin the RB #2? "Yes. Until they give us someone more dependable, yeah, I think we can win with Turbo. We've won with him. We love him."

On Michael: "C-Mike is a guy that has so much talent, but the consistency needs to get there. Can't have a good play then a bad play. So, I wouldn't be surprised if he went out there and broke one for 90 yards, but then I'm not surprised if he puts one on the ground. So, we're just telling him, he has to become more consistent. Talent-wise, the guy has all of it, but we just want more consistency from him. [. . .] It's frustrating because he's such a good player. He has such talent. We want him to 'get it.' 'Here's what it takes for you to play in this league.' You should say to yourself: 'I'm a second-round draft pick, I haven't played in two years, what do I need to do?' So we tell him, you need to become more consistent. I told him, talent-wise, your talent scale is higher than Turbo's. But, dependability-wise, professional-wise, you need to learn something from him. So the frustrating part is not seeing him be what he can be as a player."

No mincing words there with regard to Michael. Thx for sharing.

That's gotta burn Turbo a bit.

Turbin has averaged just 4.81 carries per game in his career, so it makes sense for the organization to stress the negative over the positive ("just don't screw up!") in such a limited role.

How many pass blocks would Turbin average? Maybe 10 per game? So in a lot of ways, he adds more value as a blocker than as a runner as a #2 guy.

Just 2 fumbles in 274 touches, that is nuts (plus another on a kick return, but he never should have returned kicks). He's never missed a game in three years.

I think Michael would be considered strongly for the starting job over Turbin if the team were replacing Lynch today, talent would play a bigger role there and even Smith admits that Michael is more talented than Turbin. But the #2 role and the 'play it safe' criteria it entails overwhelmingly favors Turbin.

I am fairly sure Turbin will be back next year. I just can't see anybody paying him big bucks to snag him away. I think he will be our #2 RB for a long time.

Not mentioned here is that Turbin got better in 2014. Michael seems to be showing improvement so far in 2015. It's too bad our OL is in such flux right now because it has made both Turbin and Michael look worse this preseason than they really are.

I think that c mike comes out hard this year and pushes turbin out of his number two spot..

SUhawk":ky2yxz05 said:

I think that c mike comes out hard this year and pushes turbin out of his number two spot..

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I don't, but I'd be happy to be wrong.

Haha me too

kearly":3aoob6k0 said:

Turbin has averaged just 4.81 carries per game in his career, so it makes sense for the organization to stress the negative over the positive ("just don't screw up!") in such a limited role.

How many pass blocks would Turbin average? Maybe 10 per game? So in a lot of ways, he adds more value as a blocker than as a runner as a #2 guy.

Just 2 fumbles in 274 touches, that is nuts (plus another on a kick return, but he never should have returned kicks). He's never missed a game in three years.

I think Michael would be considered strongly for the starting job over Turbin if the team were replacing Lynch today, talent would play a bigger role there and even Smith admits that Michael is more talented than Turbin. But the #2 role and the 'play it safe' criteria it entails overwhelmingly favors Turbin.

I am fairly sure Turbin will be back next year. I just can't see anybody paying him big bucks to snag him away. I think he will be our #2 RB for a long time.

Not mentioned here is that Turbin got better in 2014. Michael seems to be showing improvement so far in 2015. It's too bad our OL is in such flux right now because it has made both Turbin and Michael look worse this preseason than they really are.

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I don't see Michael as having any chance as a starter if Lynch went down now. I've seen nothing from him that is superior to Turbin. He is supposed to have this explosiveness but I haven't seen it yet. He had a really good run against KC where he burst through the hole and it looked like it was going to be an exciting play, and the safety came up to make the tackle and it didn't look like Michael had anything (speed, escapability, moves, power, etc) to make that run anything more than it was.

So what he did on that play was run through a gaping hole that the line made. It's easy to find backs who will do that. Watch 'hard knocks' and see this kid Chris Polk run. THAT guy is explosive. Knile Davis for the Chiefs was explosive. Michael, not so much.

+1, hope to be very wrong about Michael :lol:

Knile Davis has a completely different running style and hard knocks uses camera angles

The quality of our backup RBs is very poor compared to many other teams in the league. I wish we had drafted someone from this year's deep RB class, and really, really hope Marshawn elects to return for another year.

Turbin has good straight-line speed and is a solid blocker and receiver. He also does not have any fumbling issues, but he doesn't read his blockers that well and goes down too easily on contact.

Michael has excellent elusiveness, but he has a major ball security problem, does not read his blockers well, and goes down way too easily on contact.

No way around it, Coach Smith's comments confirmed exactly why Christine Michael has thus far ratified the reasons why he lasted until the final pick of the 2nd round despite possessing slam dunk 1st round natural talent.

xgeoff":1kuia0x6 said:

So what he did on that play was run through a gaping hole that the line made. It's easy to find backs who will do that. Watch 'hard knocks' and see this kid Chris Polk run. THAT guy is explosive. Knile Davis for the Chiefs was explosive. Michael, not so much.

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I'm a big fan of both Polk and Davis, and they might be better RBs than Michael in Seatle's system. But Michael is definitely more explosive. Not only to the eyeball test, but in terms of vertical jump as well.

And besides, it doesn't really make much sense to grade a RB based on one run, especially when it gained quite a few yards.

I would agree with you that Michael can't turn bad blocking into production the way that Lynch can or the way that Polk could at UW. If run blocking continues to be a serious issue I would be somewhat understanding if Seattle moved on from C-Mike.

Problem is, finding that guy who can produce behind bad blocking is really hard to do. Even most 1st round RBs need some level of run blocking to succeed.

The only RB who I think would have fit the bill for Seattle in the last draft that was available to us was the RB the Cardinals got, David Johnson. He's like a slightly bigger version of Matt Forte. I guess we'll find out how good he can be behind bad blocking this year. But to get him, Seattle would have had to lose one of Clark or Lockett, and I don't think I'd trade either one of those guys for Johnson at this point.

I wonder if the emerging Jarryd Jayne could also do this. He is surprisingly elusive.

hawknation2015":1g6b7dlr said:

The quality of our backup RBs is very poor compared to many other teams in the league.

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I think Turbin actually had a good year last season. His 4.2 YPC was perfectly respectable, especially from a back you can count on to block and protect the ball. You compare those numbers against other "name" backups from last year, and they stack up. And that's without any huge runs skewing his average. Plus, Turbin looked quite good in multiple games where Lynch had to miss the start.

With regard to reading his blockers, if you listen to Sherman Smith's full interview, he says that Turbin is actually being encouraged to improvise a little more and be less analytical about the blocking. I'd be surprised if he had any historical issue with reading his blocks; in fact, Smith suggests the opposite. He wants him to play by feel a little more, which is something Lynch does pretty frequently.

And while I wouldn't trust C-Mike over an entire season, I think a combination of Turbin/Michael could be pretty effective contingency plan over a 1-2 game stretch. Not sure many other teams can say the same about their backup situation.

DavidSeven":2r84uc46 said:

hawknation2015":2r84uc46 said:

The quality of our backup RBs is very poor compared to many other teams in the league.

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I think Turbin actually had a good year last season. His 4.2 YPC was perfectly respectable, especially from a back you can count on to block and protect the ball. You compare those numbers against other "name" backups from last year, and they stack up. And that's without any huge runs skewing his average. Plus, Turbin looked quite good in multiple games where Lynch had to miss the start.

With regard to reading his blockers, if you listen to Sherman Smith's full interview, he says that Turbin is actually being encouraged to improvise a little more and be less analytical about the blocking. I'd be surprised if he had any historical issue with reading his blocks; in fact, Smith suggests the opposite. He wants him to play by feel a little more, which is something Lynch does pretty frequently.

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Reading one's blockers requires more than simply running to the area as drawn up; it requires reading who is being blocked and who is not being blocked, taking advantage of the opportunities that are actually present. IMO, neither Turbin nor Michael do that as well as the average NFL back.

hawknation2015":2bhr63zy said:

Reading one's blockers requires more than simply running to the area as drawn up; it requires reading who is being blocked and who is not being blocked, taking advantage of the opportunities that are actually present. IMO, neither Turbin nor Michael do that as well as the average NFL back.

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But again, I am saying this is exactly what Sherman Smith is telling Turbin not to do anymore.

And I'm not sure it's fair to say that they don't do it as well as "an average NFL back." They've both put up better-than-average numbers behind an o-line that's often been problematic in both talent and calls. What would their numbers be if they ran behind Dallas's line or had Peyton Manning orchestrating the line changes?

netskier":394hbimd said:

I wonder if the emerging Jarryd Jayne could also do this. He is surprisingly elusive.

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Hayne reminds me a lot of Golden Tate as a runner. He'll make a hell of a punt returner.

DavidSeven":367vx0zd said:

hawknation2015":367vx0zd said:

Reading one's blockers requires more than simply running to the area as drawn up; it requires reading who is being blocked and who is not being blocked, taking advantage of the opportunities that are actually present. IMO, neither Turbin nor Michael do that as well as the average NFL back.

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But again, I am saying this is exactly what Sherman Smith is telling Turbin not to do anymore.

And I'm not sure it's fair to say that they don't do it as well as "an average NFL back." They've both put up better-than-average numbers behind an o-line that's often been problematic in both talent and calls. What would their numbers be if they ran behind Dallas's line or had Peyton Manning orchestrating the line changes?

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I think they would both be in a heap of trouble without five starting offensive linemen who are better at run blocking than pass pro, Tom Cable's blocking scheme, and Russell Wilson attracting attention. The only way Turbin and Michael seem capable of being above average backs is in a fantasy world where no one tries to tackle them for five yards. On any other team, Turbin is essentially Trent Richardson. Michael is Andre Ellington with fumbling issues.