Historically, how bad is this defense?

[SoulfishHawk]

PASS defense is horrific. Run defense is excellent.

That being said....3-0.

 

[bigskydoc]

Ken Norton had 2 major gaffes that made the score way closer than it actually was...

Pete needs to make a change mid-year if things like this continue to happen. He definitely needs to get a new DC when the year is out. Norton would not be a DC anywhere else in the league. He ranks at or near the bottom.

And finally I will continue to point this out. The Seahawks have ranked worse on defense year on year for 6 straight seasons. They are now well on pace for a 7th straight season. Not only that, they are now record breaking bad.

This. I may finally have a reason to change my sig.

On the bright side, if we continue to play like this, it is highly unlikely that the trend continues into next year.

The 3-0 argument reminds me of the Bevell defenders and their, "but we won a Super Bowl with him." No we won a Super Bowl despite him, and we are 3-0 despite Norton. Pete's inability to cut bad coaches is his biggest downfalling, followed closely by his egregious clock management.

 

[TwistedHusky]

Pass defense is 2x-3x more important than run defense.

The reality is we made personnel decisions that focused more on run defense than pass defense.

Carroll got what he wanted. What he wanted was just terrible. We play the 49ers twice.

It makes no sense to completely shift to beat them if you leave yourself open to everyone else.

But for Wilson throwing an unsustainable 5 TDs per game, we are losing. Which means as soon as Russ has a game he fails to throw for 5 TDs, we aren't going to win. Is it reasonable to expect 5 TD in a playoff game?

There are zero kudos for being elite against the run. Just be decent against the run. Nobody cares about being better if your pass defense is terrible. Put guys that stop the pass on the field instead. We now are giving up 1200 yds in passing in 3 games.

1200. In. 3. Games.

That is on the DC.

 

[Mick063]

I'm good with the defense. Matt Ryan, Cam Newton, and Dak Prescott have all been known to throw up gaudy numbers at times. Further, opposing offensive coordinators are entering the games with a "shoot out" mentality. The Dallas coach admitted as much. This is based just as much of a fear that Russell will run up a big lead as it does with game planning for matchup edges against the defense.

Bottom line is that I see effort and I don't see glaring mental mistakes. There is almost always a defender in the picture, close to where he is supposed to be. Not six yards of separation like we saw with the Dallas secondary.

Because younger players didn't benefit from a normal off season, I am lead to believe the following conclusion:

These young guys that are making big plays at big moments are doing so under abnormal, adverse conditions. The learning curve is steep and they are getting it slowly. The game will slow down for them.

I think the future looks bright.

Edit:

The game itself has rapidly evolved into a huge advantage for offense, and we are seeing the offensive game catchup with the rule set. Record scoring, record quarterbacking. It is all accelerating within the last five years.

Defense, in general, is not what you remembered it to be five or ten years ago. The money and rules are formatted for quarterbacks to excel. If your quarterback isn't making consistent chunk plays, you aren't managing your personell correctly.

Don't ever expect a defensive juggernaught again. Anywhere. The only way it possibly happens is with the next Lawrence Taylor clone. The game has changed. Edge rushers have become the most important defensive players on the field and quarterback pressure has become the most important defensive measure.

 

[mistaowen]

Ken Norton had 2 major gaffes that made the score way closer than it actually was...

Pete needs to make a change mid-year if things like this continue to happen. He definitely needs to get a new DC when the year is out. Norton would not be a DC anywhere else in the league. He ranks at or near the bottom.

And finally I will continue to point this out. The Seahawks have ranked worse on defense year on year for 6 straight seasons. They are now well on pace for a 7th straight season. Not only that, they are now record breaking bad.

This. I may finally have a reason to change my sig.

On the bright side, if we continue to play like this, it is highly unlikely that the trend continues into next year.

The 3-0 argument reminds me of the Bevell defenders and their, "but we won a Super Bowl with him." No we won a Super Bowl despite him, and we are 3-0 despite Norton. Pete's inability to cut bad coaches is his biggest downfalling, followed closely by his egregious clock management.

If Fitzmagic continues this trend next week and throws for 350+ yards but they squeak out a win because of Russ, I really hope Pete can take a look at Norton and see that its been consistent downward trend since he got here. The offense is scoring 35+ and still almost losing games. If the defense didn't have final stands, they could be 1-2 while Russ is on pace for one of the best QB seasons ever. 32 ranked defense coming into yesterday and they definitely did nothing to move up from the worst spot in football.

1292 pass yards (most in NFL), 497!!!! yards per game (most in NFL), 18 plays of 20+ (most in NFL), 6 plays of 40+ (most in NFL), giving up 8.5 yards per attempt (3rd in NFL), 28.7 points per game (11th in NFL).

 

[StoneCold]

Historically bad.

 

[sutz]

We did just play games against 3 of the best QBs of the last 10-15 years or so. :229031_shrug:

 

[fenderbender123]

Keep in mind that there's no home field crowd noise advantage for any teams this year, which will probably contribute to more offensive production for road teams this year, meaning defensive stats might be down this year.

With that said, yes this defense is an issue. They keep making enough plays to win, and they get me excited, but they need to get better.

 

[SoulfishHawk]

3-0

 

[potatohead33]

There is a lot of somewhat oddball stuff that happened yesterday to allow the Hawks to be in position to win the game at the end:

+2 in turnovers
safety
Dallas missed two extra points
Dallas defense committed a ton of drive extending penalties in the first half
Second chance on a two point conversion after missing the first

etc

If a couple of those don't happen then Dallas only need a FG to tie or win the game. That type of stuff is not going to happen every game

 

[SoulfishHawk]

Not having Diggs vs. the Pats made a huge difference.
Not having Dunbar vs. the Cowboys was HUGE as well.

Not trying to make excuses, because their pass office is brutal. But, there are some major guys out. Not to mention losing Irvin, Blair etc. vs. the Pats.

 

[HawkRiderFan]

Pete took the blame for the second TD to Wilson saying it was the wrong call for that situation so for whoever has said above it's Norton running Pete's D, bang on. Sounds like Pete is even involved in the calls.

We did face 3 really good teams so far. But this will tell us something this weekend. Based on who is healthy by Sunday, no offence, but if Ryan Fitzpatrick and the Phins passing attack are able to carve up the D with no garbage time involved I'll panic.

 

[bmorepunk]

Right now the scoring allowed isn't over 30 PPG. That's the upside, and it's not great, but at least they're not giving up 35 a game at this point.

I don't think the defense is really much worse than last year's, but I don't think the "Let Russ Cook" way of doing things is helping the overall numbers. The offense scores quick, they come off the field, the other team comes on the field and scores quick. Last year teams mostly got drug down into the Seahawks gutter game and would get up somewhat or go crazy in the end once the offense dropped some points.

Man, I hope they figure this out. Everybody is all clamoring for opening up the offense or whatever, but it doesn't really put this team in that much of a different position to win games. It's playing with fire like last year, where everything is on the edge all of the time and it's just some hero ball at the end, now with extra points scored in the first half.

If last year's team or this year's team could at least consistently play average defense, that's a force to be dealt with. But if we don't see a significant improvement to slow other teams down, there's going to be some real heartbreakers, including in the playoffs. It would be fun to watch Wilson throw 50+ TDs in a season, but playing defense this bad is very likely a quick bounce in the divisional or championship game.

They really gotta figure out how to limit the other teams and get them down to 22 PPG or less or it's just gonna be crazy Russell Wilson fueled offense that leads to a good amount of wins in crazy fashion but crappiness come playoff time.

 

[Sgt. Largent]

35+ pts and over 400 yds a game passing has to be historic, yes?

It is indeed historic, most passing yards given up through three games in NFL history.

To put this in context though, this is happening all over the league, without crowds all these good veteran QB's are picking apart defenses. Crowd noise is a big deal in slowing down a good QB, not only with giving your pass rushers the half second edge coming off the corners.......but making it harder to change plays at the line or make protection calls.

So guys like Ryan, Cam and Dak have feasted on our bad defense. And Russell btw, this is also the reason he's destroying defenses.

 

[SoulfishHawk]

Yeah, scoring is WAY up league wide. Shoot, for the people who bet, I'm sure they are cleaning up on the Over in these games.

 

[Chapow]

Yardage wise, this defense is obviously absolutely dreadful.

Points wise, there are 10 teams in the league right now that are giving up more points per game than we are, and the Packers have given up exactly 1 less point on the season than we have.

What is more important in football, points or yards?

Like I posted last week, I have a hard time coming to the conclusion that we are worse than teams that are giving up more points than we are. That just doesn't make much sense to me. Our D isn't even in the bottom 10 in points per game allowed.

And no, that doesn't mean I think the D is fine or whatever. They quite obviously aren't very good. But historically bad yet not even in the bottom 10 in points per game allowed this season? OK. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[Tmagopis]

Yardage wise, this defense is obviously absolutely dreadful.

Points wise, there are 10 teams in the league right now that are giving up more points per game than we are, and the Packers have given up exactly 1 less point on the season than we have.

What is more important in football, points or yards?

Like I posted last week, I have a hard time coming to the conclusion that we are worse than teams that are giving up more points than we are. That just doesn't make much sense to me. Our D isn't even in the bottom 10 in points per game allowed.

And no, that doesn't mean I think the D is fine or whatever. They quite obviously aren't very good. But historically bad yet not even in the bottom 10 in points per game allowed this season? OK. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I couldn’t agree more with this sentiment. Are things great? No, two weeks in a row it’s come down to it.
But, historically bad pass defense? Stats point to yes. Defense overall? Stats say there are 10 worse teams this year alone.
I don’t know if the Russ pick 6 was a part of this Stay or not, not entirely sure how the stats are recorded.

Pass rush needs work but saw signs of life towards the end there. If we can get things going by week 10, with Alton Taylor in a rotation to compliment mayowa and reed and Collier, we might be average. Which at this point is good enough for the playoffs for sure, and from there it’s a crap shoot with whose healthiest and paying the best.

 

[AROS]

My fantasy is we dump Norton (demote him back to LB coach which is where he shines) and Quinn becomes available after being fired as HC of Atlanta and we welcome him home with open arms to take over DC duties.

A man can dream.

 

[bmorepunk]

What is more important in football, points or yards?

The yards are disconcerting, but if the points were somewhere near 20 PPG instead of near 30 PPG I'd feel much better about the long term importance. Hopefully they get it down after this stretch.

 

[bmorepunk]

Yeah, scoring is WAY up league wide. Shoot, for the people who bet, I'm sure they are cleaning up on the Over in these games.

Scoring is typically much higher at the beginning of seasons on league averages. Right now the league average is 25.4, last year it was 22.8. In 2018 it was 23.3. It's up a couple of points per game if it maintains all season.