The Changing Seahawks Passing Attack

Thoughtfully organized food for thought.



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Would really like to get that 20+ yards one up to the 2013 and 2012 levels. I feel like those passes are what has been missing so far. Especially since we have had some good success with those plays so far, yet we aren't going back to them very much during the games.

I'm not shocked by the behind the line % going up with more plays for Harvin (since he is so explosive behind the line), but I'm with HawkFan72 in hoping that the 20+ gets back up to the 15% range or better. I think the team has some explosive guys Lockett, Richardson, Harvin, Luke Wilson, etc that can stretch the field at times. But the short game is looking pretty strong right now, so who knows if that changes in the early part of this season.

Maybe it's a season-long plan to pull those out later in the season.

Similar to how we didn't do as many fakes to Harvin until game 3 vs Denver.

The Harvin Effect

I think the short passing game has been necessary to clamp down on the fact that teams are attacking us by stacking the box and trying to disrupt the play in the backfield. It seems to be their only hope for success, and even then it doesn't work most of the time.

That invites an important note that the scope of the article is limited to a subset of statistics describing passes. What is not addressed is how the opposing defensive mix of schemes has changed over the corresponding period of time.

NorCalSeahawk":1ap3ccpl said:

I'm not shocked by the behind the line % going up with more plays for Harvin (since he is so explosive behind the line), but I'm with HawkFan72 in hoping that the 20+ gets back up to the 15% range or better. I think the team has some explosive guys Lockett, Richardson, Harvin, Luke Wilson, etc that can stretch the field at times. But the short game is looking pretty strong right now, so who knows if that changes in the early part of this season.

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I'm not sure of the stat but it seems that #24 is catching more short balls as well. :{).

I kinda wanna see Harvin on a deep route like how DeSean Jackson is used.

I think it is reflective of one primary issue and several secondary issues. The primary issue that I see is that our O-Line is not quite ready for prime time and they can't consistently buy the time needed for those longer plays to develop. As they solidify over the course of the season, I bet that we will see more and more of the long plays being called and less and less of needing last minute heroics from our elite QB. I may be one of the few who think our O-line play is very promising. Each week they look better and better. Barring injury, I can see them being a dominate force going into the latter 3rd of our schedule, once they have gelled as a unit and worked out a few kinks.

Nothing wrong with protecting the O-line early in the season by scheming to emphasize the run and keep the passes close in, especially when we have the players like Harvin and Lynch to pull it off successfully. There will be times in these early games where we need to pull the longer plays out of the playbook, but by using them sparingly we minimize the risk and we benefit from not showing our weak long-game hand too many times to opposing defenses.

I honestly believe that the ability of Denver to get back in the game stemmed from three things, two of which we can expect to get significantly better as the season progresses. O-Line not quite mature as a unit, key defensive players not quite in game shape, and a stupid mistake or two.

- bsd

dopeboy206":24bziszo said:

I kinda wanna see Harvin on a deep route like how DeSean Jackson is used.

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I have been surprised that we haven't seen Harvin on more deep crosses and go routes.

Maybe he has been but Russell just hasn't thrown it to him. All I know is if we want to stretch the D, we're going to have to start unleashing Harvin and P-Rich more often..........and not just rely on Lockette every 3rd game.

On the other hand, despite facing Julius Peppers, Clay Matthews and Von Miller, we've "only" given up 6 sacks.
And a sack is more damaging than a long pass is gaining, because a short gain puts you closer to a first down or gains one, whereas a sack will always put you in a more difficult position to convert.

I like to think that when we are holding up well in pass protection that will become more like a 20/40/20/20 behind/short/middle/deep pass percentage attempt. When that is the case, there will be no cheating by defenses and we'll shred them

You're basically replacing Tate/Rice with Baldwin/Harvin who can gain quick seperation.

Then I think because you have WRs who can seperate better, Bevell learned his lesson last year in drawing up too many long-developing plays in which the offense goes into its playground style, so you're seeing the Seahawks trying to protect Wilson with a short-range passing game.

And it makes sense having a rookie RT and an LT playing mediorce trying to play catch-up on his training and conditioning.

Honestly, I love the fact that the Seahawks are changing up their bread and butter offense and building success of a short passing game + power run game = time consuming ball control offense which keeps opposing offenses off the field and fatigues opposing defenses.

Kind of what San Diego did to us... but the Seahawks still have potential for big time splash plays but I just think they are trying to get away from that predicatable run, run, play-action deep pass they've been relying on the better part of the last two years.

I also think when teams eventually start learning to defend the current offense the Seahawks will counter with the long ball aspect and I think its one of the reasons why you're not seeing the attempts as well as guys like Harvin and Richardson run deep routes despite all that speed.

dopeboy206":3raof51v said:

I kinda wanna see Harvin on a deep route like how DeSean Jackson is used.

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I cannot fathom why we don't send Percy on go routes once in a while. Even if it's just as a decoy he'll draw the back part of a defense way down the field, we should be able to kill it over the intermediate middle of the field doing that, I'd think.

*shrug*

The O-Line needs to block longer for those long routes to develop.

I think we will see a lot more later on.

Defensive ends seem to be containing Wilson a bit better too, keeping him from rolling outside the pocket and hitting the long plays that develop with time and improvisation. That defensive tendency could mean we'll see more of him stepping into what little pocket out line creates, and either scrambling middle, or hitting quicker throws.

This league is all about matchups. The sample size is much to small to draw any conclusions.

Let's watch them against a few bad teams for some relative comparisons.

Mick063":ey23wzzp said:

This league is all about matchups. The sample size is much to small to draw any conclusions.

Let's watch them against a few bad teams for some relative comparisons.

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^^yup

3 games into the season. There were probably 3 game stretches the other seasons that are the same as '14.

Harvin does get more WR screens, but let's play this out. I think Bevell and Pete are just barely scratching the surface of was is to come.