Huge Al Woods at end? Five defensive linemen work wonders for Seahawks in the opener
New play caller Shane Waldron’s tantalizing debut. Russell Wilson’s four touchdown passes. Tyler Lockett’s two, beautiful scoring catches.
All headlined the Seahawks’ 28-16 win over the Colts in the season opener in Indianapolis.
Yet the most surprising — and for the Seahawks, encouraging — development Sunday: their previously questionable defensive line.
The Seahawks had three sacks — by linemen Rasheem Green, Darrell Taylor and Benson Mayowa — and 10 hits on Colts debuting quarterback Carson Wentz.
Last season Seattle didn’t have three sacks in a game until week five, against Minnesota.
“I felt like it worked together very well today,” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said Sunday before the team flew home. “And I thought we felt our pass rush much more than we have, like early in last season.
“Much more like how we finished the 2020 year.”
What’s changed on Seattle’s defensive front from last year to now?
1. Scheme.
The Seahawks went with five defensive linemen for large parts of Sunday’s first half, when the game was in doubt.
Yes, the team that last year at this time wasn’t sure it had five effective defensive linemen on its entire roster was playing that many at one time Sunday.
That was in response to the Colts sending running back Jonathan Taylor plowing into Seattle’s line for big gains early. After that, the Seahawks at times had 330-pound tackle Al Woods outside an end, with Bryan Mone and Poona Ford inside him at tackle and Taylor at the opposite end.
The five defensive linemen had Seattle’s desired result. After 16 yards on his first three carries, Taylor had 6 yards on the his final six rushes to end the first half. Seattle went from down 3-0 to up 21-10 in that span.
Perhaps thinking of the Tennessee Titans coming to Seattle next Sunday, Carroll played coy when asked about using five defensive linemen at a time against the Colts.
“Well, we’ll see. I don’t know. That might have been a mistake in the substitutions today,” Carroll said.
His laugh wasn’t the only reason that was unconvincing.
“The reason we’re able to do that is because of the versatility of the players, the edge players,” Carroll said of Seattle’s roster loaded with ends. “So, we’ve been developing that ability for a while now to see how flexible we can be. We have a number of guys that can all do it. We didn’t see a whole lot of Alton (Robinson) today, but he’s in that mix, too.
“It’s just part of it.”
The defensive line has new strongside end Kerry Hyder signed from San Francisco, Rasheem Green looking strong to begin the final season of his rookie contract, Mayowa (one sack Sunday) and Carlos Dunlap back as weakside ends and impressive 2020 Robinson limited to only 12 snaps in the opener; Carroll didn’t mention an injury to Robinson.
They are already showing more versatility than the Seahawks’ defensive front did the first eight games of last season. Lack of pass rush up front without having to blitz was a large reason Seattle was leading the NFL in points and yards passing allowed the first half of 2020.
2. Taylor made his NFL debut against the Colts.
That worked out OK for the Seahawks.
All preseason the talk was of Taylor switching from end to a strongside linebacker on early, run downs this season. But in Game 1, Taylor mostly had his hand on the ground, on every down, as the end Seattle drafted him to be last year.
The second-round draft choice in 2020 missed his entire rookie season with the Seahawks following leg surgery. He looked more than healed against the Colts.
Taylor made the defensive play of the game with 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter and the Seahawks leading 21-10. Indianapolis had a fourth and 2 on Seattle’s 18-yard line. Taylor flew in off the left edge of Seattle’s defense as if shot from a bazooka. He destroyed two Colts on one, wowing play. Right tackle Braden Smith was tackling him in desperation as Taylor bulled through him to Wentz. Taylor drilled the quarterback for a sack that gave Russell Wilson and the offense the ball on downs. Seattle still led by 11 points.
On the first play following Taylor’s brilliance, Wilson hit Metcalf on a 30-yard pass. A few plays later, Wilson to Metcalf from 15 yards over the middle for the touchdown put the game away. Seattle led 28-10, and the game was effectively over.
“Yeah, yeah, big rush,” Carroll said of Taylor. “He had a number of rushes.
“You can see it: When we get him with the 12s (in Seattle), he’s going to be 12s’ best friend, now. When they can get to roaring on third down and on passing downs and get him the chance to get off — you can see how explosive he is coming off the football — he’s going to have some big games.
“He’ll have some big games where it’ll be really hard for people to match him up. So I’m excited about that, and it showed.”
3. Mone is stepping into a larger role.
Then again, he has to.
Seattle has only three true defensive tackles. Mone, 345 pounds in his third season after being an undrafted free agent from Michigan, is getting more first-team snaps.
Mone bulled through Indianapolis’ offensive line most of Sunday afternoon. His five tackles and one quarterback hit only begin to describe his eye-opening opener.
“Mone did a great job,” Carroll said. “He was causing problems the whole time.
“You know, Bobby (Wagner) had 13 tackles, but we kind of expect Bobby to have 13 tackles. But for Bryan to have a game like that to get us started — and I know Al played well, too. Those two big guys did a great job, so that’s great for Bryan.”
The front’s effectiveness pressuring Wentz meant the back four defensive backs did not have to cover as long. Wentz had just one completion of more than 16 yards against Seattle’s secondary with new starters Tre Flowers at right cornerback and D.J. Reed moved from right to left cornerback.
Carroll said the credit went both ways on defense.
“The back end, though, definitely knocked down a couple different route concepts that allowed us to get to him, and the rush was really consistent and persistent,” the coach said. “And it worked together really well.
“So it’s a good start for us, really good start.”
But it’s just a start. Just one game, with some angry Titans coming to Seattle next weekend off Tennessee’s 38-13 home loss to Arizona Sunday.
“Yeah, I thought we came out with a lot of energy. Getting those stops on fourth down really gave us a lot of juice,” star safety Jamal Adams (six tackles, one leap of the Colts’ center to force Wentz to lose a fumble on fourth down).
“But we definitely can be better,” Adams said. “This is one game. At the end of the day, we aren’t going to get too high or not going to get too low. We understand that it is a win, but the ultimate goal is at the end. We want to celebrate at the end.
“So, we are just going to watch the film, get better, correct the mistakes and get ready for Tennessee.”
This story was originally published September 13, 2021 at 5:14 AM.
