Difference maker for Seahawks defense from Vikings game to win over 49ers? Ryan Neal
Ryan Neal came out of the visiting locker room at Levi’s Stadium wearing a smile as large as his contribution to a revival.
All week, the mantra for the Seahawks’ defense ransacked in its previous two games — 985 yards and 63 points allowed in losses to Tennessee and at Minnesota — was simple.
“Hold your one-eleventh.”
That is: Each man, one of the 11 defenders, being accountable to doing his job on every play.
Neal was more like half the reason the Seahawks’ stonewalled the San Francisco 49ers from the end of the first quarter to garbage time in the fourth of Seattle’s season-changing, 28-21 victory in the hot Bay Area sun Sunday.
He made four stops on third downs, almost by himself fixing a problem from the week before in Seattle’s loss at Minnesota.
The Vikings went 9 for 13 converting third downs.
With Neal playing, the 49ers were 2 for 14.
Neal had as many stops himself on third downs as his entire team had without him the week before in losing at Minnesota.
“Yeah, thanks for bringing it up,” coach Pete Carroll said Sunday when The News Tribune mentioned Reed’s excellence after the game. “Ryan seemed to have a great game today.
The Seahawks had been using a five-man defensive line through the start of the first four games this season, including Sunday. That was to stop the opposing teams’ running games.
San Francisco and Jimmy Garoppolo came out mostly throwing against that in the first quarter. They easily marched 71 yards to the game’s first touchdown on the 49ers’ opening possession. During that drive, Carroll and defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr.’s answer was nickel defense, with fifth defensive back Ugo Amadi.
After the first quarter, San Francisco had 167 total yards of offense. The Niners were on pace for 668 yards.
Then the Seahawks put Neal into the game, as a sixth, dime defensive back with Amadi to throttle the 49ers’ quick-passing game.
It became: What took them so long?
Undrafted out of Southern Illinois in 2018, picked up by Seattle after Atlanta gave up on him at the start of the 2019 season, Neal was Seattle’s best player Sunday on a Seahawks defense that REALLY needed someone to emerge.
He had as many snaps on defense as you had through the first three games of the season. Neal was on the sidelines the previous week watching Amadi commit a foolish and costly holding penalty during a third-down sack on a drive that should have ended but became a Vikings touchdown. Amadi also gave up numerous third-down completions while Kirk Cousins went 30 for 38 for 338 yards to beat Seattle 30-17.
After that game, Carroll decided to have Norton change the defensive backfield. They benched cornerback Tre Flowers. They gave Sidney Jones his first Seahawks start, at left cornerback Sunday. They moved D.J. Reed, the starting left cornerback the first three games, back on the right corner where he excelled at the end of last season.
And, most decisively against the 49ers, they made Neal a part of the pass defense for the first time in 2021.
Only 23 completions allowed in 41 attempts by Jimmy Garoppolo and rookie Trey Lance, after Garoppolo left after the first half with a calf injury he said he got on the game’s first drive. San Francisco scored just six points from the first drive of the game, before Neal came on, until 1:20 remained in the game — garbage time in a two-score game.
The first touchdown came when Jones got physically overwhelmed by 49ers tight end Ross Dwelley for an easy, 21-yard touchdown pass. Like against the Vikings, it looked like San Francisco’s coaches out-schemed Seattle’s on the play, isolating a 6-foot-5, 235-pound tight end on a 6-foot, 186-pound cornerback for the score.
The other Niners touchdown before garbage time came when Jones blew a coverage and let Deebo Samuel alone down the right sideline behind Jamal Adams for a 76-yard touchdown. That briefly trimmed Seattle’s lead to 21-13 late in the third quarter.
Neal entering took outside linebacker Jordyn Brooks out of the game. That left Bobby Wagner as Seattle’s only linebacker in passing situations.
In the second quarter Neal faked a blitz up the middle before the snap, then quickly got outside right to break up the blocking on a third-down screen pass to Kittle. That ruined the play, and the 49ers punted.
It was significant. Minnesota had shredded the Seahawks’ defense with screen passes the previous week, and 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan has an array of screens in his playbook. Neal’s play seemed to discourage Shanahan from calling many more Sunday.
“Yeah, that was film study, tendencies. Everybody was alerting it out there,” Neal said. “It wasn’t just me. We had Bobby out there, ‘Hey, alert! Screen! Alert! Screen!’
“So I just looked around, seeing what was going on and made a play.”
Neal then broke up a pass on another third down later in the second quarter. In the third quarter, Neal ended San Francisco’s first drive after halftime when he stopped Lance inside on the rookie quarterback’s zone-read option run inside short of the line to gain.
“That was something, looking at the tight end and how good he was, we just thought that the match-up might work out for us and it help us a little bit,” Carroll said of finally using Neal.
“He had a beautiful game. I don’t know how many wins, but I thought he had some breakups on third downs. It was huge for the game.”
Neal knew early this past week he was part of the planned solution to correct many of the Seahawks’ problems on defense.
“We put it up in practice this week, and we said, ‘Hey, when we get the opportunity we are going to see what happens,’” Reed said. “We went out there, ran it, had some successful drives — a lot of successful drives — so it worked out well for us, man.
“I’m glad we put it in, made some changes. Guess we will see some more of it.”
Including Thursday night when the Seahawks (2-2) face Matthew Stafford and the Los Angeles Rams (3-1) that knocked Seattle out of last season’s playoffs.
Neal excelled last season as a dime defensive back; he was the reason the Seahawks used more six defensive backs in 2020 than Carroll had in previous seasons.
What did he (re-)prove Sunday?
“Just that I can get the job done,” he said. “Whenever my number is called, you know what you are getting. You are getting Ryan Neal, a guy who can fly around and make plays and just loves to play the game.
“I’ll run through a wall for anybody. My teammates know that.”
Neal wasn’t just appreciative of finally getting in on defense Sunday and making a defense in the Seahawks’ first win in nearly a month.
He’s appreciative of his every chance in the NFL.
“Every, single day I go into that facility I (give thanks),” Neal said. “Where I come from, where I’m at now, where I’m going, I’m always grateful. Any opportunity I get to step on the field, special teams, defense, I’m happy.
“I’ve already beaten the odds, so in my mind, I’ve won, you know what I mean?
“Whenever I get the chance I’m just happy to be there.
“Heck yeah.”
This story was originally published October 3, 2021 at 9:09 PM.
