Seahawks second best player for 2018 is their most important

Russell Wilson is a top-five quarterback in the NFL. But he is just the Seahawks second best player though also the most important.

So, the last bit of that Headline 2 might be a bit confusing. Am I trying to say that while Russell Wilson is the Seahawks most important player (by far) that he isn’t the best? Why, yes I am. Because this isn’t a list of who the most important players on Seattle’s a 2018 roster would be (for the record, 1-10 would be Wilson, Russell), it’s an opinion of who the best players are.

Any while Wilson may be a physically gifted quarterback and top-five (in my opinion) at his position in the NFL, he is the best player in Seattle. You will have to read another forthcoming article for who is number one. But if you want to know who the fifth, fourth and third best players in Seattle are, you can just click those links.

Last season Wilson was forced to be a part of every Seahawks touchdown except one. J.D. McKissic scored on a run play in week four. Other than that, every Seattle offensive touchdown was either a Wilson pass or run.

It may say a lot about how ineffective Seattle’s offense was that cornerback Justin Coleman had two interception returns for touchdowns. Or, in other words, twice as many touchdowns as the Seahawks running backs had rushing combined.

Wilson was asked to do too much last year. And the last month of his season was not a good one as Seattle lost three of their final four games and missed the playoffs. Wilson was brilliant in the fourth quarter nearly the entire season. But in the first halves of games he was not even league average. And that was part of the issue with his 2017 year.

In first halves of 2017, Wilson threw for 8 touchdown passes and had 6 interceptions. In the second halves, that number went to 26 and 5. His first half passer rating was 78. In the second half it was 112. So while the offense sputtered in the first halves of games, some of it may have been Wilson’s fault.

Just looking at the statistics, Wilson should have been in the NFL MVP conversation no matter his team’s record. He led the NFL in touchdown passes with 34. But Wilson also had an inconsistent year with numbers within any given game that were schizophrenic.

Still, the Seahawks need Wilson. It is difficult to imagine the team being as successful as it has been over the last five seasons with nearly any other quarterback. Wilson makes a bad offensive line winnable by escaping and throwing accurately on the run. Tom Brady couldn’t do that, for instance.

Next: What exactly did Doug Baldwin mean when he talked about the Seahawks this week?

Wilson is a great football player. He is one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL. The Seahawks need him to win football games. But another has become the best player in the 2018 Seattle roster. Wilson is still the most important, however, as an NFL team cannot win without a good quarterback.