Russell Wilson, Carlos Dunlap owning frustrated Seahawks’ latest loss in Green Bay
Many Seahawks were stepping up on their way out of Wisconsin. They were taking accountability for what they did — and did not do.
Almost none were making the plays that would have earned Seattle one its biggest wins in years, a victory that absolutely was there to seize.
Instead, the Seahawks have sunk to the second-worst record in the NFC. It’s their worst mark after nine games since also being 3-6 on their way to 7-9 in 2011.
Carlos Dunlap stood in the middle of every frustrated Seahawk Sunday evening in Green Bay. That was five dozen players, plus many dozens more coaches and staff.
In the middle of a locker room absorbing yet another avoidable defeat, one of the team’s oldest and more-accomplished players copped to a childish act. It helped ruin a chance a reviving victory at a place Seattle hasn’t won in a generation.
Dunlap threw an opponent’s shoe.
Down just 3-0 in the fourth quarter to Aaron Rodgers and the Packers, the Seahawks’ surprising, 31st-ranked defense was trying to rise yet again Sunday. They were heading back to their huddle readying for a third down near midfield.
Then, well after the play and basically alone in the center of the field, their two-time Pro Bowl defensive end in his 12th NFL season grabbed a Green Bay player’s white, spiked shoe and flung it toward the Packers’ huddle.
Officials immediately flagged Dunlap for wholly unsportsmanlike conduct. The 15-yard penalty, the most unforced of errors, gifted Green Bay a first down at Seattle’s 27-yard line instead of having third and 3 at the 42.
A 3-0 game became 10-0 a few plays later. A.J. Dillon scored the touchdown with 10 minutes left gave the Packers an insurmountable lead, since Russell Wilson was generating zero points in the Seahawks’ first shutout loss since 2011.
That’s how a team gets to 3-6.
“I just took ownership for it. Foolish mistake, and it won’t happen again,” Dunlap said Sunday night just outside the door of that locker room at the bottom of Lambeau Field, where Seattle hasn’t won since 1999.
“There’s not much to it. I pride myself in being someone they can count on, versus letting them down in that scenario.
“I just wanted to make sure they knew where I stood with it.”
Where the Seahawks stood Monday upon arriving back home from the 17-0 loss to the Packers was with the second-worst record in the NFC just past the season’s halfway point.
“Foolish mistake. I take full accountability for it,” Dunlap said said again. “Won’t happen again.”
Did one of the Packers rile him up or was pestering him all game long culminating in him throwing a shoe?
Dunlap chuckled, ruefully.
“No,” he said. “It was a foolish mistake.”
The Seahawks have had too many of those this season.
DK Metcalf got thrown out of Sunday’s game. He got in a fight and grabbed the face mask of Green Bay safety Henry Black with 83 seconds left. It was his seventh penalty in nine games. He’s been called for unsportsmanlike conduct and personal fouls after plays, jawing and pushing with opposing defensive backs. He’s even been penalized for getting in the face of a foe during a teammate’s touchdown, Gerald Everett’s score in Seattle’s opening game, its win at Indianapolis.
“Tired of losing,” Metcalf said in explanation of his ejection Sunday night.
Pete Carroll looked just plain tired on his way out of Green Bay.
The Seahawks’ coach said Monday on his weekly day-after radio show back in Seattle that Metcalf deserved to get ejected.
“Just frustration,” Carroll said. “He responded to them jawing at him ... didn’t pull out of that situation quick enough and gain control of it.”
About Dunlap’s folly, Carroll said Sunday night before leaving Green Bay: “Carlos’ penalty, that was a terrible mistake. He knows it. He owned up to the team and apologized and knows that’s never going to happen again, of course. But that was a big play right there, obviously, and a chance to stop them right there at midfield.
“In a game this tight, stuff is amplified and a play here, a play there and that’s what happened.”
While Dunlap on defense felt he let the offense down, the offense felt it let the defense down.
That’s what losing six of nine games feels like.
Gerald Everett stood in a hallway beneath Lambeau Field. The tight end was asked: Do you as an offense that produced just 160 yards passing and zero points in the team’s first shutout loss since September 2011 (24-0 at Pittsburgh) feel like you let down your defense that kept Rodgers and the Packers out of the end zone until deep into the fourth quarter?
“I personally do. I personally do,” Everett said.
“Russ is going to be hard on himself,” Everett said, adding the entire Packers defensive front was all over Wilson from Seattle’s first offensive plays of the game and that any quarterback would have had a difficult time Sunday.
Left tackle Duane Brown, the Seahawks’ best offensive lineman, was beaten for one of Green Bay’s three sacks of Wilson. It was early in the game when Whitney Mercilus bulled through him and pushed him into the quarterback. It was the seventh sack allowed in nine games by the 36-year-old Brown, who is in the final year of his contract.
Brown would have allowed an eighth sack on the season, but Wilson ducked under Mercilus’ sack past Brown in the second half Sunday.
Brown left the game with a groin injury. Jamarco Jones played the final 21 snaps at left tackle. Brown’s status is unknown for Sunday when the Seahawks play their latest must-win game against NFC West-leading Arizona (8-2) at Lumen Field.
Wilson said he let the whole team down in Green Bay. Two of his tosses were worse than Dunlap’s.
In his first game after a month sidelined by a broken finger and surgery, Wilson threw two interceptions into the end zone. Wilson threw into a total of five Packers covering Metcalf on the first interception and Tyler Lockett on the second crushing turnover Sunday
“It’s on me,” Wilson said.
“Those two plays, I mean, that really were the defining moments in the game.
“Unfortunately, it comes on my shoulders because I didn’t fulfill those two big plays in those two moments. I don’t want to shy away from it.”
He had a lot of company in that regard leaving Green Bay.
“We’ve just got to play smart,” safety Jamal Adams said after his first interception in two seasons with Seattle Sunday. “In crucial situations, we can’t have penalties. Those things lead to points, especially playing against a great group of guys like (the Packers).
“It’s definitely going to get us beat at the end.”
This story was originally published November 15, 2021 at 11:05 AM.
