Pete Carroll on Seahawks’ targeted Jamal Adams: ’I think he’s doing really well’
Pete Carroll is not about to do what most everyone else outside of his sphere is doing.
He’s not going to say the Seahawks’ giving Jamal Adams a $70 million contract is proving to be a richly bad investment.
“For anybody that is highly compensated then you guys are going to take a good look at it and maybe give another look, a third look, about: What’s up?” Seattle’s veteran coach said Friday of the highest-paid safety in NFL history.
The team’s new deal with Adams this summer includes $38 million guaranteed.
The deal came a year after the Seahawks traded two first-round draft choices to the New York Jets to acquire the 25-year-old Adams, a one-time All-Pro and three-time Pro Bowl safety when he was entering the final year of his rookie contract.
Carroll’s comments came the morning after the Los Angeles Rams targeted Adams and beat him for two game-changing pass receptions, 81 yards and a touchdown that put the Rams ahead by two scores entering the final quarter of Seattle’s 26-17 home loss.
“I think he’s doing really well,” Carroll said.
“I think he’s an effective, impacting football player. He is put right in the middle of the fire on so many different concepts. He’s right where the ball is going. So he’s got a lot of opportunities, and so you aren’t going to win all of those.”
Rams coach Sean McVay and quarterback Matthew Stafford went right at Adams to turn the game Thursday night. On a third and 10 in the third quarter with Seattle leading 7-3 and mostly throttling Los Angeles’ offense, receiver DeSean Jackson ran a deep post route. Seahawks left cornerback Sidney Jones, making his second Seattle start, turned and ran with Jackson then appeared to release him to Adams’ deeper, zone coverage.
So preoccupied with not getting beaten deep, Carroll’s cardinal rule, Adams was sprinting back as if racing to Pioneer Square. Then Adams turned around while Stafford’s pass was in the air. Adams looked over one shoulder, spun around and looked over the other shoulder. By then, Jackson had adjusted to Stafford’s underthrown ball. Adams was running back. Jackson caught the pass 3 yards in front of the back-pedaling Adams.
Jackson kept running, sharply to his left around other safety Quandre Diggs across the field, all the way to the Seahawks 12-yard line. Instead of punting down 7-3, the Rams took that 68-yard gain and turned it into a touchdown two plays later for their first lead.
“We can’t have guys third and 10 and we give up big plays like that,” Diggs said. “That’s unacceptable.”
Carroll called it “a screwball, around-the-park play.”
Seattle’s previous game, at San Francisco, Diggs and left cornerback Sidney Jones were involved on a miscommunication and blown zone coverage that resulted in Deebo Samuel running free down the right sideline for a lonely, 76-yard touchdown catch and run.
in the third quarter Thursday, from the Seahawks 13-yard line, tight end Tyler Higbee was lined up in the right slot. He ran a simple out route of about 15 yards, running right at Adams then easily breaking outside of the safety in the end zone. Stafford’s throw was a relatively uncontested, 13-yard touchdown with Adams three steps behind Higbee as the ball arrived.
Assessing those two plays in particular, Carroll said Friday Adams “got (in a) really awkward, unusual situation on the underthrow last night.
“And then he got beat on a one on one. So, would we have loved for him to win the one on one? Those are hard. They ran it well and timed it well, did a nice job. They got him.
“And the other play, you know, it’s just a screw-ball, in-the-park play and wasn’t able to find a way to get to the ball like he needed to.
“So, I think he’s doing really well.”
The Seahawks had cut the Rams’ lead to 16-14 on a remarkable, 98-yard touchdown drive by three-years-cold Geno Smith off the bench for the injured Russell Wilson Thursday. On the ensuing possession, Rams running back Sony Michel wiped out blitzing Seahawks linebacker Jordyn Brooks with a great pass block. That allowed Stafford time to watch wide receiver Robert Woods (12 catches, 150 yards) run a crossing route behind linebacker Darrell Taylor and in front of Adams. Adams appeared to have middle-of-the-field zone responsibility but was outside Bobby Wagner as the middle linebacker ran with wide receiver Cooper Kupp deep.
This season, Adams is blitzing more than a third of the time less frequently than in 2020 when he set an NFL record for sacks by a defensive back with 9 1/2. He has no sacks and no quarterback hits through five games. For that matter, he has only one pass defensed this season. Opponents had completed nine of 16 passes targeting Adams entering Thursday, per Pro Football Focus.
That’s not why the Seahawks just signed Adams to the richest contract for a safety in NFL history this summer.
“He would the first to tell you: He wants to play better. He wants to be right more,” Carroll said. “That’s...he’s a great competitor. He’s not satisfied with nothin’.”
Adams blitzed three times in 38 drops back to pass by the Rams Thursday. One blitz by Adams was on a run play away from him.
As for the numbers showing Adams is blitzing one-third less often this season, Carroll said: “The numbers are right.
“We’ve sent him, and he’s been in a bunch of calls, and he’s in the game plan,” Carroll said. “We’re not not trying to keep him out of it. It’s just sometimes the formations and the big-spread offenses that we’re seeing a lot of in the first month of the season here, it just limits the opportunities.
“The calls don’t fit sometimes because of the formations. We can’t just rush him all the time because he has a lot of other duties that he has to take care of.
“I would love to see him have more impact on the game by pressuring, too. So that’s why we build that stuff in (the game plan) every week.”
This story was originally published October 8, 2021 at 11:18 AM.
