No, the Seahawks don’t need to go pass-happy to score
The Seahawks have been ripped for running more and throwing less than any other team. It seems their critics never bothered to check the scoreboard.
The NFL is all about airing out the football these days. That isn’t likely to change anytime soon. In fact, it’s more likely that with the ever-increasing focus on safety, the passing game will get even easier. When Pete Carroll made good on his promise to bring the running game back to the Seahawks, many pundits laughed at the supposed antiquated offense in Seattle. Frankly, they were wrong.
Last I checked, the job of the offense is to score points. And the Hawks did that better than 25 other teams last year. I expect Seattle to score even more points this year. In fact, I expect them to have their best offensive output ever. But first, let’s compare two teams that happened to score exactly the same number of points last year: the Seahawks and the Steelers.
Seattle ran the ball 534 times and passed just 427 times in 2018. Meanwhile, Pittsburgh ran 345 times and passed the pigskin a whopping 689 times. That’s a ratio of runs to passes of 1.25 for the Seahawks, and a ratio of .501 for the Steelers. Or you could say that for every 20 times the Hawks threw the ball, they ran it 25 times. In Steeltown, for every 20 times they attempted a pass, they only ran 10 times. That’s an absolutely amazing difference.
And yet, Seattle scored 428 points, just the same as Pittsburgh. The Steelers actually scored one more touchdown that the Seahawks (that via the ground game, no less). But the Hawks made up the difference in the kicking game. Both teams scored 35 touchdowns via the air. And that brings up the topic of efficiency.
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Russell Wilson was easily one of the very best quarterbacks in the league last year. If the job of an offense is to score touchdowns, the job of the quarterback is to put his team in position to score. The biggest component of that would be throwing touchdown passes. Wilson was the second-most efficient quarterback in the league in 2018. He found the end zone on 8.2 percent of his passes. Only the ridiculously great season of Pat Mahomes was better, at 8.6 percent.
On the flip side, Wilson was tied sixth for throwing the least interceptions per attempt. His seven picks amounted to just 1.6 percent of all his attempts. For every interception he threw, DangeRuss tossed five touchdowns. That’s better than Pat Mahomes and his 4.2 TD/INT ratio. Tom Brady checked in at 2.6 scores per pick, by the way. For those who thought Aaron Rodgers had a terrible year, I’ll admit it was far from his usual performance. But he did throw 25 touchdowns against just two interceptions. A 12.5 TD/INT ratio shows Green Bay had a lot more problems than at quarterback.
Wilson was extremely efficient in the passing game. Much has been said that with a weapon like him, the Seahawks are crazy not to use him more. Some more, sure. But in the past, Wilson has been at his best when throwing less. In seven seasons he’s thrown over 500 times just twice, in 2016 and 2017. You may recall those as the years without a running back. Those were his two worst seasons for QBR, or Total Quarterback Rating, and two of his three worst for passer rating. His 95.0 in 2014 was the only other year in which he scored less than 100 points in the category.
So how dd the Steelers fare with their all-out air attack? They completed 35 touchdown passes and were picked off 17 times. Ben Roethlisberger had 34 touchdowns and 16 picks if you want to just compare the front-line talent. Still, that’s a ratio of 2.1 scores for every pick. That’s not very good. The Steelers threw 262 more passes than the Seahawks. In the end, they had no more points to show for it with the added bonus of 10 extra turnovers.
dark. Next. Wilson on pace to be the NFL's best ever
I don’t care if Wilson only throws the ball 200 times this year. Okay, that’s a bit extreme, but you get the point. They don’t have to throw a lot to score a lot. As long as the Hawks have one of the top-scoring offenses in the league, as they did last year, I’ll be happy.