Kenny McIntosh sprains knee, 3rd Seahawks running back hurt in 9 days; Geno Smith sharp
The utmost thing Pete Carroll and the Seahawks want to come of their annual mock-game scrimmage: No injuries.
Yet they got one Friday evening.
Geno Smith was sharp passing (10 for 15, 171 yards). Second-year outside linebacker Boye Mafe and undrafted rookie receiver Jake Bobo (seven receptions, 76 yards, the winning touchdown catch) continued their strong training camps with big plays.
But the story of the Seahawks’ scrimmage Friday evening at Lumen Field: Rookie running back Kenny McIntosh, who has had an impressive early training camp with lead back Kenneth Walker and rookie second-round pick Zach Charbonnet injured, sprained his knee on a carry in the second half.
“We’ll see what happens to Kenny,” coach Pete Carroll said. “Sprained his knee somewhat.
Undrafted rookie cornerback Andew Whitaker, a national hurdles champion in track at Division-III Washington University in St. Louis who has a biomedical engineering degree and wants to be a doctor, also injured his knee. He left the field on the back of a motorized cart in the first half.
Carroll said McIntosh and Whitaker will get evaluated more Saturday, a players’ day off from practice.
McIntosh, the seventh-round pick from Georgia, had his legs bend awkwardly under him while getting tackled by undrafted rookie linebacker Levi Bell on the line of scrimmage. That was on a running play in the second half of the no-tackle, full-pads scrimmage McIntosh got up, which seemed a feat in itself. He walked to the sideline but continually flexed his left knee.
Fellow running back DeeJay Dallas tapped the seventh-round pick from Georgia on top of the helmet. Trainers came over. Eventually, they had McIntosh walk to a training table behind the Seahawks’ bench. There, a doctor evaluated his left knee.
McIntosh walked from the tent then got an athletic wrap around his left leg, above and below the knee outside his pads and pants. He watched the reminder of the scrimmage from the edge of the sideline.
Walker remained out with a groin injury. The Seahawks’ 1,050-yard rusher as a rookie last season hasn’t practiced since the first day of training camp July 26. He has a groin injury.
Carroll said Walker is going to be returning to practice soon.
Charbonnet participated fully in warmups Friday but did not appear to get into the scrimmage. He returned to practice Thursday after missing four days with a shoulder injury.
Carroll said the team expects Charbonnet to be full go in practice Sunday.
Competition for starting jobs
Less than a week before their first preseason game, the Seahawks are providing hints on who their new starting cornerbacks, primary nickel defensive back and starting center are going to be to begin the season.
As they have so far throughout training camp, Tre Brown on the left and Michael Jackson on the right were the starting cornerbacks Friday.
Jackson was the Seahawks’ starting left cornerback last season, opposite Pro Bowl rookie Tariq Woolen. Woolen is on the physically-unable-to-perform list following his arthroscopic knee surgery in May. He was slapping teammates on the back and laughing with them on the field before Friday’s scrimmage.
Coaches expect Woolen back in the middle or so of this month. When he returns, the question becomes who deserves to start with Woolen more: Brown or Jackson? Both have had standout camps so far.
The three preseason games that begin Thursday against Minnesota in Seattle will help determine that.
And this: Rookie Devon Witherspoon, the standout cornerback from the University of Illinois and the fifth pick in the NFL draft in May, may indeed be the primary nickel defensive back for Seattle Sept. 10 in the opening game against the Los Angeles Rams. Witherspoon practiced at that off and on this week. Friday, he was the nickel on the first play and first series the starting defense had against quarterback Drew Lock and the second-team offense.
Witherspoon broke up a pass on his first series, a short pass by Lock to an out route by Bobo.
The 6-foot, 185-pound Witherspoon was known as a ferocious tackler playing way above his relatively smaller size at Illinois. This week at Seahawks training camp, he smashed 6-7 tight end Colby Parkinson to the grass on a screen pass and wide receiver Dee Eskridge into the sideline with a shoulder into Eskridge’s chest seconds after a catch in front of him.
“I just said it’s part of my game that people should realize that I bring to the table,” Witherspoon said. “I’m kind of undersized, but I just don’t want people to underestimate me thinking ‘Oh he’s not that big, so he won’t hit you.’ That’s a lie. I just try to be as physical as I can be and want to bring a lot of juice.”
Coby Bryant, last season’s primary nickel as a rookie, entered on the first third down for the starting defense as a sixth defensive back, with Witherspoon. The Seahawks have been using dime with six defensive backs playing Witherspoon and Bryant together a lot through the first eight practices of camp.
Bryant was the primary nickel on the second series for the starting defense. He was also a safety with the second-team defense against Geno Smith and the starting offense. Bryant began practicing at safety for the first time last weekend.
That, defensive passing game coordinator Karl Scott said, is a nod to Bryant’s skills defending passes in flight.
“He’s instinctive as far as playing in space,” Scott said Thursday of Bryant. “As far as what the league is going to in match-ups and all that good stuff, the day and age of a ‘box’ safety (think: Kam Chancellor, near the line of scrimmage like a linebacker) are long gone. Few and far between are guys that can actually cover, inside, and not just the tight end.”
Evan Brown makes a move
Veteran Evan Brown started the mock game, the second consecutive day he’s been the starting center.
That broke what had been an alternating pattern of rookie fifth-round pick Olu Oluwatimi starting every other practice with Brown the first seven practices of camp.
Oluwatimi was the center for Lock and the second-team offense Friday.
“It’s taking shape. Both of the guys are battling,” Carroll said before the mock game.
“We’ve alternated them and we’ll see how long we’ll continue to do that. (Friday’s) a really big day for both of those kids to show us.”
Brown, 26, signed a one-year contract at a near-minimum base salary of $1.25 million with a $1 million signing bonus in the offseason. Brown played more guard than center last season for Detroit; he ended the 2022 as a starting guard, after veteran center Frank Ragnow returned to the Lions’ offensive line from injury.
Now, after Thursday and Friday, Brown is inching ahead in the competition with Oluwatimi. The team’s return to practice Sunday following a players’ off day Saturday will tell more.
Brown said this week the differences in Seattle’s and Detroit’s systems include run-blocking techniques and fits for where the blocker’s strike points are on defenders at the point of attack.
“I’m building on each day,” Brown said. “All I can do is focus on what I can do. All I can do is improve.
“Of course it’s a competition. But at the same time the goal is making the line better and making the Seahawks better.”
Bobby Wagner, QB?
The scrimmage ended with Drew Lock’s touchdown pass to Bobo, between two defenders.
“He’s got a lot of confidence, a lot of swag,” Smith said of Bobo, from UCLA. “Everybody around here loves Bobo. We are happy to see him make those plays, because he can be a very good player.”
Bobo is going to get a chance to win a job behind top three receivers DK Metcalf, Tyler Lockett and rookie Jaxon Smith-Njigba. That’s because the NFL suspended Eskridge on Friday for the first six games of this season, following a domestic-violence incident with the mother of his child, in February.
A team staffer then handed miniature footballs to Bobby Wagner. The six-time All-Pro linebacker signed them and threw them into the lower deck of Lumen Field, to screaming fans.
The last one he threw landed at the hands of a guy wearing a Seahawks throwback jersey of Hall-of-Fame wide receiver Steve Largent. Inexplicably, given his attire, the guy dropped the ball.
This story was originally published August 4, 2023 at 8:03 PM.
