Ty Okada starting, excelling in a Seahawks defense not schemed according to plan
Ty Okada wasn’t supposed to be this prominent in the Seahawks’ plans this season.
Yet there he was in the last game, exactly where he was Seattle’s first game of 2025.
On the spot.
Five minutes remained in the Seahawks’ test against Houston Oct. 20 at Lumen Field. The Texans had a first and goal, down two scores with 6 minutes left. They were 3 yards from their last hope to get back in the game.
Okada, on and off the Seahawks’ practice squad in 2023 and ‘24, was making his fourth consecutive start for Seattle. It was the fourth start of his NFL career. The former Montana State Bobcat was again at safety, because Julian Love was out again with a hamstring injury.
On first and goal, Okada came up hard from his alignment in the end zone to stop Houston’s Jo’quavious Marks from scoring from the 3 on a run off left tackle. Okada tackled Marks at the 1.
After an incomplete pass that C.J. Stroud threw away, Stroud rolled right. Houston’s quarterback had wide receiver Xavier Hutchinson breaking free outside of coverage from Seahawks cornerback Riq Woolen, to the right side of the end zone. Okada was between the Hutchinson-Woolen matchup and Stroud, in the right flat.
Okada leaped to bat down Stroud’s pass just inside the goal line, to save a touchdown.
“I could feel it there (the receiver open behind him). I could see the quarterback’s eyes, and I felt that was where he was going (with the ball),” Okada said in the locker room after Seattle’s 27-19 win.
“He threw it fast. Obviously, I would have loved to pick it, but just to be able to get my arm up in time for that was...I was very happy to have that happen.”
The guy Seahawks teammates jokingly call “Tyrone” also had 1 1/2 sacks of Stroud last week. Those were the first sacks of his career, on blitzes coach Mike Macdonald has done far less than he’d planned to this season.
Macdonald didn’t expect to start Okada in four of the first seven games. He didn’t plan to have Derion Kendrick as a nickel defensive back, or even on the roster until late August. Kendrick was with the Los Angeles Rams when the Seahawks set their defense this summer.
The head coach in his second year as Seattle’s defensive architect didn’t have Drake Thomas as the starting inside linebacker next to centerpiece Ernest Jones this season, either.
Yet because of injuries to Love, Pro Bowl cornerback Devon Witherspoon plus rookie starting safety Nick Emmanwori, Okada, Kendrick and Thomas have been key contributors. They’ve helped make Seattle’s defense number-one in the NFL against the run. Seattle is seventh in points allowed.
The Seahawks (5-2) lead the NFC West entering their game Sunday at the 3-5 Washington Commanders (5:20 p.m., NBC, KING-5 locally).
“I can list off all the examples of when guys play great and they deserve to play that we’re willing to play guys. Drake is an example,” Macdonald said Wednesday. “(Starting safety) Coby Bryant’s an example. Our running-back situation, receiver is an example. The guys that are playing on special teams are examples.
“This is how we roll right now. That’s not how we want to do it. But if someone starts playing really great and we can’t take them off the field, then we’ll put them on the field.”
Specifically on defense, they aren’t doing it the way Macdonald planned to. Not just in personnel, but in scheme.
Macdonald’s designs for 2025 had Witherspoon and Emmanwori blitzing in disguised pressures from different spots in the defense. The idea was to augment pressure on quarterbacks to whatever his defensive front of Leonard Williams, DeMarcus Lawrence, Jarran Reed and Byron Murphy could supply.
But Witherspoon and Emmanwori missed eight games combined through the season’s first half.
Because of Williams, Lawrence, Reed and Murphy up front, Seattle has spent the first two months among the NFL’s best in pressure rates with one of the lowest blitz rates. Murphy has been breaking out in his second season. The team’s first-round pick in 2024 out of Texas has 4 1/2 sacks — and a new baby boy. Williams and Lawrence each have three sacks.
They’ve been so good affecting QBs, the Seahawks have often covered with seven, against four and five eligible pass receivers. Those numbers obviously favor Seattle’s defense.
The Seahawks are using “sub packages” with extra defensive backs a league-leading 91% of the time. That is per Macdonald’s plan coming into the season. But he’s blitzing only 17% of the time, the league’s third-lowest blitz rate.
“Frankly, we’ve detoured pretty significantly from where we thought we were going to be at the beginning of the season,” Macdonald said. He acknowledged pressure is one such area of detour.
“I think it’s really what we’re doing well and what our guys have shown that they’re good at — which is good, to me,” the head coach said. “That paints a clear picture. Means we’re watching our players and we’re listening to them. We’re listening to them when they tell us through how they play what they do well.”
Ty Okada’s growth
Emmanwori got hurt on the fifth play of the season. Lawrence fell on the back of the rookie safety’s leg, as the second-round pick was tackling San Francisco’s Christian McCaffrey for lost yardage in week one.
Okada entered at big nickel, in Macdonald’s Emmanwori-based plan that day to slow McCaffrey and the 49ers’ running game. The Niners countered with play-calling head coach Kyle Shanahan immediately targeting Okada with passes for a first down then a touchdown to tight end George Kittle. When Macdonald tried to blitz Okada as that game plan had called for with Emmanwori, Okada went nowhere but into 49ers blockers. They essentially swallowed the 5-foot-11, 200-pound safety.
The 49ers picked on Okada to the point Macdonald abandoned the big-nickel plan of a fifth defensive back being a safety in that game. Witherspoon moved inside to nickel, slot cornerback, as he did most of last season for Seattle.
It was in that role Witherspoon got hurt in the second half of that opening game. He collided with Josh Jobe as the Seahawks’ outside cornerback was leaping to intercept a pass from Brock Purdy.
Emmanwori missed three games with a high-ankle sprain, though he’s back now. Witherspoon has missed five games. But he practiced fully Wednesday. He’s poised to start Sunday against the Commanders, for the first time since week four at Arizona Sept. 25.
Okada has kept playing because Love has missed four games with an injured hamstring. Okada has rapidly improved with more experience. He had his best game yet against Houston. He’s no longer getting picked on, not by the Buccaneers, Jaguars and Texans the last three games.
Seattle’s won two of those three games to rise to the top of the division. “Really proud of Ty. Talk about another guy as we walk in the door — just does everything right all the time with a great attitude,” Macdonald said. “His teammates love him. Just an absolute worker. He’s tough, smart.
Macdonald and veteran leaders had a team meeting the night before the Texans game. Their emphasis in it: Uphold the standard, no matter who is hurt and who is filling in.
Jones, the defense’s quarterback and signal-caller, said that standard has been clear since the first day of offseason practices this past spring: Be the NFL’s most dominant defense. “We take a lot of pride in upholding the standard,” Macdonald said. “Ty is one of those guys that does it.
“He’s done a phenomenal job. He’s worked his tail off for this opportunity. He’s helped us win two football games here in the last three games.”
After a shaky start, and with continued, unexpected opportunities, Okada is upholding the standard.
The News Tribune asked Okada after he starred against Houston what the meeting the night before and “upholding the standard” mean to him.
“It’s just whoever steps on that field is upholding the standard that our starting 11 have set,” Okada said.
“Julian is an incredible leader and an incredible person. He helps me prepare, week in and week out. We have some phenomenal guys on defense that, just, every time I go out there I want to uphold the standard that we’re the best defense in the league.
“And that’s what we expect, no matter who’s out there. No matter what 11 guys are out there.”
This story was originally published October 30, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
