Tyler Lockett equals Steve Largent, Rashaad Penny has career day, Seahawks romp at Houston
Tyler Lockett leaped. He dragged feet inside sideline boundaries. He caught passes in coverage and when wide open — when he made himself wide open.
He was the best player on the field. Again.
How good? Hall-of-Famer-Steve-Largent good.
Pete Carroll, his 70-year-old coach, likened Lockett to Lance Alworth, the Hall of Famer from the 1960s San Diego Chargers, because of his grace and athleticism.
“Lance is a good one,” Lockett’s quarterback, Russell Wilson, said.
“I don’t think there’s anybody like Tyler Lockett.”
Still somewhat unheralded across the NFL, the Seahawks’ nominee for Walter Payton Man of the Year for all he does off the field dominated the lowly Houston Texans on it Sunday. He led rebounding Seattle to a 33-13 victory at large, and largely empty, NRG Stadium.
Lockett raced behind two Texans for a 55-yard touchdown pass from Wilson to break a 10-10 tie late in the first half. He celebrated by pantomiming a freestyle swimming stroke face down on the fake grass in the end zone.
Lockett had a ballet-like catch, leaping over a defender and putting down one foot, then two, in front of teammates along the sideline for a 29-yard gain in the first quarter, when the Seahawks (5-8) were actually losing to the 2-11 Texans. He celebrated that trick by signaling That got Jason Myers into position for a field goal.
“Boom, boom. One, two,” Wilson said. “Those are the kinds of plays that makes him special.”
Lockett had another 29-yard catch inside the sideline, twisting his body and tapping his toes, on third and 9 in the fourth quarter. That led to Gerald Everett’s game-clinching touchdown catch midway through the fourth quarter.
Almost for kicks and grins, Lockett added two more points on the ensuing conversion pass from Wilson. He weaved among four defenders in the end zone to almost steal the ball from them before they knew where he was. That put Seattle up by 14 points.
Lockett’s 142 yards receiving and Rashaad Penny’s career highs of 137 yards on 16 carries and two scores, including a 47-yard touchdown run late, led the Seahawks’ second-half surge that turned a 16-13 problem in a 20-point breeze.
Wilson threw to Lockett repeatedly for huge, game-changing chunks of yards. Lockett caught four of seven deep targets of 20 or more yards. His 137 air yards were the most in the NFL by a receiver in a game this season.
What else is new?
Lockett leads the NFL in deep targets (32), receptions (15) and deep-pass yards (601) this season. He’s tied for first in deep-pass touchdowns with four this year.
“Those of us that watch Tyler Lockett on a regular basis, I mean, this was another masterpiece today,” Carroll said, shaking his head, “of just body control, getting open to the sidelines. The balls that Russ threw to him, just such a graceful, beautiful athlete.
“I was thinking about Lance Alworth. ...Tyler looked just unbelievably on it today.”
Again.
Lockett has 1,023 yards this season. He joined Largent as the only Seahawks with three consecutive seasons with 1,000 yards receiving. Largent did it from 1978-81 and again from 1983-86.
“Man, that’s a blessing,” Lockett said. “I was just telling him, it’s funny because we got the same birthday and we were born and raised in the same hometown – Tulsa, Oklahoma — it’s just pretty funny that just something like that was to happen.
“Ultimately, I just thank God for even putting me in this position.”
He says his toe drags and taps with innate sense of where the sideline is on any pass and how to stay inside the boundary while still grabbing passes with defenders on his like shoulder pads comes by something of — get this — accident.
“It’s something that I do without even knowing that I do,” Lockett said. “Catching the ball like in (morning) walkthrough, or maybe even at practice, when I’m not even on the sidelines, but I’m practicing it without even thinking about it. A lot of it is trying to have awareness of where you are on the field, knowing how close you are to the sidelines, knowing if you need to go toe drag or hurry up, chop your feet to get in — but also being able to know where the defender is and how to take a hit.”
It’s a lot. And few in Seahawks history have done it better than Lockett.
Few in NFL history, Wilson says.
“He does everything right,” Wilson said.
“He’s a smaller player, but he plays big. He’s able to catch everything, able to be in the slot, able to play outside.
“I think Tyler is going to be one of those guys who is forever remembered. In my opinion, he’s had a Hall-of-Fame-type career, just how he’s approached it. I don’t think people talk enough about him, what he’s been able to do.”
Wilson completed 17 of 28 passes, though still missed some he usually completes in his fifth game back from surgery on his throwing hand. He threw for 260 yards and the two touchdowns.
Chants of “SEA! HAWKS!” echoed through the giant, mostly empty stadium over the final 5 minutes of Seattle winning for the second consecutive week following a three-game losing streak.
The Seahawks are 5-8 heading to Los Angeles to play the rival Rams (8-4), still needing to win their final four games for a realistic shot at making the NFC playoffs for the ninth time in 10 years.
One of the teams Seattle is trying to catch also won Sunday. San Francisco rebounded from its loss in Seattle last week and beat Cincinnati in overtime. The 49ers are 7-6.
Incredibly, given how bad the Seahawks have been for most of this season, they are just one game in the standings out of the final NFC playoff spot. Washington (6-7) currently owns the seventh and last seed.
Washington owns the tiebreaker with Seattle because it beat the Seahawks Nov. 30. But four games remain to see if that tiebreaker will matter.
Now comes the test to see if this Seahawks resurgence toward the playoffs is real. They head to Los Angeles to play the Rams (8-4 entering their game Monday night with 10-2 Arizona). The Rams are the division rivals that ended Seattle’s season in the first round of last season’s playoffs, the team the Seahawks have yet to conquer.
Wilson is healthy again, past the eight weeks from finger surgery his surgeon said he’d miss. Lockett is excelling. The Seahawks finally have Penny and a run game, albeit after facing a downtrodden foe.
Carroll told his players all this past week, and in the locker room after Sunday’s win, that December and the final games of the season are historically the Seahawks’ time.
“Yeah, they’ve been hearing it,” Carroll said. “This has always been a build-up to the finish and the mentality that it takes. I think they responded in a big way this week because they looked to me like they’re fundamentally continuing to improve. ...
“I’m really proud that we’re still moving ahead. We’re going to get challenged like crazy this week, and all the way through the finish.”
Davis Mills?
Lockett, Penny and Wilson finally put away a Texans team that stayed within one score of the lead into the fourth quarter with rookie, third quarterback Davis Mills.
The former Stanford passer started for Tyrod Taylor and completed his first 14 passes deep into the first half, when the scored was tied at 10. That was until Lockett burned two Texans defenders for his 55-yard score with 52 seconds left in the second quarter.
Mills missed on 16 of his next 27 throws after his hot start.
The Texans’ last points came on a 61-yard field goal by Ka’imi Fairbairn on the final play of the first half. It was the fifth-longest field goal in NFL history.
What changed? The Seahawks tightened their soft zone coverage underneath that Mills and the Texans had exploited for easy catches and first downs early in the game, and their pass rush began affecting the rookie QB.
Darrell Taylor had his sixth sack of the season in the second half for one of the Seahawks’ five drive stops after halftime. Two of those were on fourth down, for turnovers on downs.
“I feel like we executed a lot better,” Seahawks linebacker Bobby Wagner said. “I think that first drive they were able to move the ball down the field, we didn’t execute as well as we should have. But after we kind of calmed down and started to lock in, we were able to stop them from scoring.”
The Texans wanted to run. But Seattle again stopped an opponent from doing that. Houston had just 63 yards on 25 carries. For the second consecutive game defensive tackle Al Woods moved off his usual spot as the nose tackle directly over the center. Again, it worked.
It was the fifth time in seven games the Seahawks held a team under 95 yards rushing.
“I think we’re just coming downhill. We’re being aggressive,” Wagner said. “You have guys like Big Al up front who caused a lot of havoc up front and helps us as linebackers come downhill and play faster.
“Everything works together, but we understand that each week, we’ve got to make a team one dimensional, and it starts with the run game.”
Penny breaks out
Penny had a strong game in a limited role in Seattle’s win over San Francisco the previous week. Playing more with Alex Collins injured and Chris Carson out for the season following neck surgery, Penny had a 27-yard catch and run on a screen pass and a key blitz pickup to allow a 17-yard completion by Wilson.
Yet he was in a secondary role against the 49ers while future Hall-of-Fame running back Adrian Peterson got the start and the headlines in his Seattle debut.
Sunday was Penny’s time.
Peterson didn’t play because of low-back pain the 36-year-old had coming out of last week’s work. That and Penny’s game against the 49ers earned him his second start of the season.
He romped.
Despite sitting and kneeling, stretching on all fours on the sideline behind the bench while Seattle’s defense was on the field, Penny bolted for 77 yards on his first nine carries.
Playing with five games left on his contract, Seattle’s first-round draft choice in 2018 ended with his best day since his previous career-high 129 yards on 14 carries Nov. 24, 2019, against Philadelphia.
That was two weeks before he tore knee ligaments against the Rams. He missed 12 months, from December ‘19 to Dec. 2020. vs Eagles.
“I’m just thankful,” he said.
He, again, thanked his coaches and the Seahawks for not giving up on him.
Savvy Dunlap
Carlos Dunlap has had his play limited to a dozen or fewer plays over the latter half of this season.
Yet the 32-year-old defensive end continues to make plays that change games.
Sunday, Houston was trying to run some clock at the end of the first half backed up on its own goal line. Seattle used a time out on defense before the Texans’ third and 9 with 1:13 left in the second quarter.
Mills rolled to his right to avoid pressure and extend a pass play. He wanted to throw to a safety-valve receiver in the right flat. But Dunlap covered the running back. The veteran did it in a way that didn’t give Mills a path to run, yet he stayed between the back and Mills to discourage the quarterback from throwing to him. Mills waited, waited with the ball and finally Dunlap finally charged him at the sideline to force the QB out of bounds.
Not only did that force fourth down and a punt, it saved Seattle its last time out.
The play after the Texans’ punt, Wilson threw his rainbow touchdown pass to Lockett to put the Seahawks ahead 16-10.
It’s not a play that shows up in the box score, other than a tackle. But it’s a play Seahawks coaches will praise and highlight for headiness and poise while in film review Monday.
Woods again
The mammoth Woods, 34, continues to look fresh and vibrant at defensive tackle after taking last season off because of his concerns about COVID-19 with a baby daughter at home.
Woods shared a sack with Rasheem Green in the first half and tied his season high with five tackles over the first three quarters. He celebrated each one of those stops WWE-wrestler style, with loud yells and big waving of his large arms toward cheering Seahawks fans in the otherwise largely-empty stands.
“I was just overly excited to be out there with the team,” Woods said outside the Seahawks’ locker room. “It was a beautiful day, man. The sun was out, no clouds in the sky (Houston had its stadium roof open for a game on the 55-degree day for only the second time in eight years).
“It was just a beautiful time. So, just excited for all of that. It just kind of game out every time I made a play.”
Not everything Woods did was worth celebrating. He was called for roughing the snapper contacting Jon Weeks on a successful Texans field goal in the second quarter. Houston took the points off the scoreboard and the first down by penalty.
“I don’t know what that was, because I didn’t touch him,” Woods said. “He came into me, and he started tapping his head, and the ref bought it.
“He was talkin’ about ‘He touched me! He touched me!’ I was like, ‘Bruh, I’m 360 pounds. I touch you, I WANT to touch you.’ I didn’t touch him.
“I was like, ‘Yeah, whatever. I’m about to go back some plays and destroy your offensive line other there, too.’”
Woods stopped running back Rex Burkhead on second down then Mills threw incomplete on third, so Houston settled for a field goal instead of a touchdown to end that drive, anyway. That tied the game at 10.
Woods was all over the defensive line making plays and getting into the backfield the previous game, Seattle’s win over San Francisco.
Mone, Heslop carted off
The Seahawks lost defensive tackle Bryan Mone to a serious-looking knee injury in the first half.
“Bryan sprained his knee,” Carroll said. “Let’s just keep it at that right now until we know more.”
Carroll said it’s the other knee from the one Mone injured in 2020, when he played in 10 of 16 games.
This story was originally published December 12, 2021 at 1:22 PM.
