Seahawks first day of training camp: focus on Shaquem Griffin
Pete Carroll had a lot to say after the first day of training camp for the Seahawks. And boy, did he ever say a lot about Shaquem Griffin.
We’ve already touched on Pete Carroll’s press conference at the wrap-up of the first day of camp for the Seahawks. He talked about the situation with their safeties, and so much more. If you watch his press conference, we’ve got a spoiler alert: at the end he snaps his fingers, and half the defensive fronts of the NFC West just disappear. Don’t believe me, huh? So where’s Aaron Donald? For now, just read what Carroll had to say about Shaquem Griffin, a man who has quickly become one of the most popular Seahawks.
I’ll admit, it’s time to temper our expectations for Shaquem Griffin. At least a little bit. I’ve certainly been enthusiastic about him, as has virtually everyone who’s written about him. I expect great things from him on the field, and I’m hardly the only one. So it was really good to get a dose of reality today from Pete Carroll after the first day of camp. He had a lot to say about the newest Griffin on the team:
"We just want to see him keep growing, and understand the position. He has not played a lot behind the line of scrimmage. It’s important for him to just get the feel for it, and to utilize his instincts and his speed. We’re really trying to get him to utilize the run-through principles that he has the ability to do, and the chase and the scrape type of abilities, because he’s so fast. He gained a lot of ground here in the offseason. The last week was his best week, so we’re hoping when we come back we’ll see more of that and just more comfort."
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As Pete said, Griffin played on the edge an awful lot for the undefeated Golden Knights of Central Florida. That’s how you get 33.5 tackles for a loss and 18.5 sacks in your last two seasons of college. He was an absolute beast in college, but there aren’t a whole lot of edge defenders in the NFL playing under 230 pounds. So that position Pete’s talking about is weakside linebacker, where he can learn from an absolute stud, K.J. Wright. Hang on, folks. Carroll had more to say about Griffin:
"He is a pass defender, you can see that already, so we just need to make sure that he’s making progress. He’s a good learner and he studies really hard, he’s working diligently at it. There’s nothing to point to that he’s not gonna get it done. It’s just gonna take some time. His experience is really what we’re working on, and trying to get him familiar with the new position."
So while he’s learning how to apply his crazy speed and athleticism to what’s basically a new position for him, he’ll crush it on special teams and in more than a few packages, too. Whether he really ran a 4.38 at the Combine or not hardly matters. That just got everyone’s attention. He definitely has Pete Carroll’s attention. Now it’s his job to keep it. He certainly seems to be doing everything he can to do just that.