How good are these Seahawks, really? Uneven, 27-20 win at Atlanta better not be indicative
Are they as good as their roaring start at Atlanta? Up 24-0 on two Russell Wilson touchdown passes to rookie DK Metcalf before the angry-turning-apathetic Georgians really got truly into booing their faltering home team?
Or are they as bad as their second half against the fallen Falcons, two quarters that were uglier than rotten peaches?
How ugly? Seattle got outscored 20-3 after halftime and out-gained 346-82 by a 1-7 team in a half-empty stadium. It allowed a 38-year-old quarterback making his first start in four years to throw for 460 yards.
It was the kind of ugly that makes one wonder if this 6-2 team is really worthy of a long-term run into and through the playoffs.
The way the Seahawks trudged—glumly, mostly silently—into their locker room beneath Mercedes-Benz Stadium immediately after this 27-20 win suggested they realize they may not be as strong as their record suggests.
The only Seahawk who was beaming in the tunnel outside that locker room was a former one; retired wide receiver Ricardo Lockette from the team’s Super Bowl teams of 2013 and ‘14 was hugging old friends.
The current Seahawks? They overcame themselves to beat a bad Atlanta team.
But, hey, the Seahawks continued their best start to a season since they were 7-1 in 2013, on their way to winning the Super Bowl. Seattle is 4-0 on the road for the first time since 1980.
It just, they sure didn’t sound like that afterward.
“Well, let’s talk about the first half first...,” quarterback Russell Wilson said with a wry smile when asked what the heck happened in the second.
“The second half? We’ve got to be better. We’ve got to find ways to be better, and to be more sharp.
“If we want to go where we want to go,” he said, meaning the Super Bowl, “we’ve got to be great every quarter.
“That’s the reality.”
Wilson had the luxury of talking big picture after another brilliantly efficient performance: 14 for 20, 182 yards passing, two touchdowns in that runaway first half to Metcalf. His passer rating was 131.7. Perfect is 158.3. It was the seventh time in eight games this season it was been above 100, the standard for an excellent day for an NFL quarterback.
It was 24-0 with Wilson throwing, Tyler Lockett (six receptions, 100 yards) making more ridiculously difficult catches with defenders all over him and Chris Carson plowing for 86 of his 90 yards before halftime. The defense forced two turnovers by Matt Schaub, who was filling in at quarterback because 2016 NFL MVP Matt Ryan was out for the first time in 164 games with a sprained ankle.
Metcalf had a pack of folks—more than a dozen—walking into the dome in downtown Atlanta Sunday morning. The rookie wide receiver’s hometown of Oxford, Miss., is relatively close. Closer than the 3,000 Seattle is away from home.
The rookie gave his pack a show.
Wilson started 3 for 7 passing then completed seven of his next nine throws. That included the two scores in the first half to Metcalf. That’s twice as many touchdowns as Metcalf had in his first seven NFL games.
Metcalf’s second touchdown catch of the half came when he must have been invisible to the Falcons. How else to explain no defender noticing the 6-foot-4, 229-pound receiver in the left slot then running across the middle of the end zone from left to right? Wilson had a free rusher in his face, but no matter. He just flicked the ball over him to the lonely Metcalf for an easy touchdown of 2 yards to make it 24-0 late in the second quarter.
That was the 20th total touchdown for Wilson this season (17 passing, three rushing) against one interception.
“It means a lot, just to be back in the South,” Metcalf said, “and ballin’.”
The half ended appropriately. Schaub took a deep drop for a change, after getting the ball out quickly all half. That was because he was attempting a Hail Mary pass from midfield to the end zone with the first-half clock expiring. Jadeveon Clowney sacked him and forced a fumble Ziggy Ansah recovered.
Coach Pete Carroll leaped off the sideline and pumped his first triumphantly at that play.
The Falcons got booed off the field by the relatively few Georgians who were here and still cared. They got drowned out by the roars of the many Seahawks fans celebrating Seattle’s most points in a half in three years, since Nov. 2016.
Thing is, the Seahawks had to play the second half, too.
Atlanta stormed to a touchdown on its first drive after halftime, a 23-yard run by Brian Hill past Bobby Wagner—who broke the Seahawks’ franchise record for tackles but definitely not on that play—and Tedric Thompson. It was 24-8.
Then it was 24-11.
Then it was 1 yard from being 24-18.
The Falcons gained 155 yards to the Seahawks’ 2 in that third quarter. Wilson got sacked twice after halftime by an Atlanta defense that had just five of those in its first seven games. The defense missed tackles, had penalties, did basically nothing, either.
Letting a 1-7 back in the game is not what the best teams, ones with realistic hopes to go deep in the playoffs, do. They bury 1-7 squads by then.
“It was lousy,” Carroll said of his team’s second half.
He blamed himself, then said he wouldn’t detail why.
But his and his staff’s decision to rest previously banged-up starters such as Pro Bowl left tacke Duane Brown, veteran linebacker K.J. Wright and guard Mike Iupati for a series each in the middle parts of the game, when it was 24-0 and 24-8, seemed to rob the starting units of the urgency that dominated the first half.
“I didn’t do a good enough job, Carroll said. “Obviously they went out there and we looked like we were a totally different team, so I don’t know. There are a lot of things. I’m not going to go into it, but there’s a lot of things that take place when you don’t play well and I just got to do a better job making sure that that doesn’t happen.”
If Marquise Blair, another rookie second-round pick, hadn’t made a huge play to force a fumble at the Seattle 5-yard line in the fourth quarter, who knows what could have happened to the Seahawks?
The rookie safety was making his second consecutive start, and second in the NFL, at strong safety after Bradley McDougald’s back spasms. McDougald played briefly, one series, before Blair returned to change the game.
Atlanta was in the red zone seemingly ready to cut what had been Seattle’s 24-0 lead to 24-18 early in the fourth quarter. Schaub completed a pass short to running back Devonta Freeman to the 1-yard line. As Freeman was falling toward the goal line Blair swiped his hand into the ball that Freeman held between his with stretched arms. The ball came loose an instant before Freeman hit the ground.
Wagner recovered the fumble. And Blair had yet another big play in his impressive, limited debut season.
Instead of being ahead only 24-18, the Seahawks went up 27-11 with 6 minutes left on Jason Myers’ 54-yard field goal at the end of the ensuing, 10-play drive.
“Marquise showed up,” Carroll said, after being impressed by him in his first NFL start against Baltimore the previous week.
Wilson finished 14 for 20 passing for 182 yards and the two touchdowns while getting sacked twice by the NFL’s 29th-ranked pass defense.
Carson, playing in Atlanta for the first time since he went to high school here, had 90 yards on 20 rushes and the touchdown. Seattle rushed for 151 yards, 130 in that runaway first half.
Schaub finished 39 of 52 for 460 yards, a touchdown and an interception. The Seahawks got two sacks, by Wagner on a linebacker blitz and Clowney on that Hail Mary play to end the half. They had one sack in their previous three games.
The Seahawks stayed 1 1/2 games behind San Francisco for the NFC West lead; the 49ers stayed undefeated by smacking Carolina 51-13. Seattle and San Francisco play in Santa Clara Nov. 11.
Before that the Seahawks come home Sunday to host Tampa Bay (2-5), which lost 27-23 at Tennessee.
They are unsatisfied with 6-2. They have eight games to improve.
“The first half is over; 6-2 isn’t exactly the best it could have been, but it’s pretty darn good at this time,” Carroll said. “We made the most of it.
“I wanted to really finish this half, get it over with and see where we were as we kick in to the second half, because the whole thing gets started now. It’s no different than that game. You’ve got to get going, you got to finish this thing.
“So the start of the finish is now on us. And we’ll look forward to that.”
Wagner a Seahawks all-timer
Wagner became the Seahawks’ all-time leader in tackles with two on the first defensive series of the game.
His 985th career tackle put him ahead of Eugene Robinson.
“He’s got plenty of years left. I don’t know how anybody could ever break that record,” Carroll said. “I think he’s going to own that forever.”
Wagner appreciates his entire career being with the Seahawks. They drafted him in the second round in 2012, one round before they selected Wilson.
“Hopefully that number continues to grow as I play here. I want to play here for a long time,” Wagner said.
“I’m thankful for all my teammates that helped me, starting with the D-line. It started with (former Seahawks tackle) Brandon Mebane talkin’ all that trash. So, he helped me get my first tackle. I appreciate him.
“Just humbled.”
Kendricks steals
Former Seahawks defensive coordinator Dan Quinn made two curious decisions in the second quarter.
The Falcons’ coach decided to try to 51-yard field goal on fourth and 2 at the Seattle 33-yard line. Matt Bryant missed that wide left, setting up the Seahawks at their own 41 for a shorter drive to their first touchdown.
On Atlanta’s next possession, Quinn decided to go for the first down on fourth and 1 from his own 34-yard line. The Falcons got it, only because Kendricks was sure it was going to be a run and left the right flat uncovered for a pass to the tight end for a first down.
But two plays later, Kendricks leaped in front of Julio Jones on a seam route and intercepted Schaub’s pass at midfield. The Seahawks turned that short field into a 1-yard touchdown run by Chris Carson.
It was Kendricks’ first interception since 2013 for Philadelphia. That was his second season in the NFL.
Flowers out, McDougald watches
McDougald, Brown and Germain Ifedi played after being questionable to.
Seahawks’ starting cornerback Tre Flowers and new safety Quandre Diggs did not.
Flowers had started every game this season at cornerback before Sunday. He was inactive with a neck-stinger nerve injury. Diggs, acquired this past week in a trade with Detroit, was inactive because of a hamstring injury he got when wth the Lions in week four. Carroll said Friday Diggs didn’t do much this past week because of the strain.
Akeem King started for Flowers at cornerback. Neiko Thorpe entered in the second quarter and also played a series there.
McDougald was active and played one series for Blair, in Seattle’s ugly third quarter. McDougald had missed the Ravens game with back spasms, then surprised Carroll and the Seahawks by returning to practice Thursday.
Blair and Thompson were the starting safeties.
On the offensive line, the two starters who had been questionable entering Sunday started. Pro Bowl left tackle Brown started for the first time in three games. His biceps injury improved. Right tackle Ifedi passed his pregame test of the knee Carroll said he “tweaked” in practice Thursday.
Quinton Jefferson, the team’s most consistent producer on a weak pass rush through seven games, was inactive. The Seahawks had declared him out for the game Friday because of an oblique strain. That meant more playing time for rookie first-round pick L.J. Collier as a rotational defensive end.
Ansah had been questionable to play because of a sprained ankle that caused him to miss the previous game. But Ansah was active for the fifth time in eight games. He had one tackle and one hit on Schaub, plus that fumble he recovered the end of the half..
The Seahawks chose Penny, their 2018 first-round pick, as their backup running back over C.J. Prosise for the Falcons game. Prosise was inactive. Penny had two snaps and no carries the previous week against Baltimore.
Penny had a 19-yard run in the first half. He finished with 55 yards on eight runs.
Seattle’s other inactives Sunday were safety Lano Hill (out indefinitely with an elbow injury) and rookie draft picks John Ursua and Gary Jennings—again—at wide receiver.
This story was originally published October 27, 2019 at 1:08 PM.
