Recent history suggests Seahawks need to make things weird to beat Packers

The Seahawks and Packers have played memorable games over the last decade. That recent history shows Seattle needs weirdness to happen to beat Green Bay.

The Seahawks and Packers have played 19 times over the years. Since Russell Wilson became Seattle’s quarterback in 2012, the two teams have met 7 times. Wilson has never beat the Packers in Green Bay, but the Packers have never beaten Wilson in Seattle. Unfortunately, Sunday’s divisional round is in Green Bay.

It is somewhat surprising that Seattle and Green Bay, arguably the NFC’s two most consistent winners over the last decade, have only played each other once in the playoffs. Seattle won, but it was because things got strange. In fact, normally when the Seahawks beat Aaron Rodgers and Green Bay it is because some odd things have occurred.

Wilson has thrown 3 touchdowns against 6 interceptions in Green Bay. Mind you, 5 of those interceptions came in one game in 2016. At home, Wilson has thrown 7 touchdowns for Seattle against 4 interceptions. But all 4 of those interceptions came in one game. A game that the Seahawks won, the NFC Championship game on January 18th, 2015.

So Seattle has beaten the Packers four times since 2012. In January of 2014, they beat Green Bay 36-16. That one was easy. But the other three, odd events unfolded. Last year Seattle trailed 14-3 in the first quarter and 21-17 at halftime. The Seahawks scored a touchdown with 5:08 left in the 4th quarter to take the lead and Seattle won 27-24.

But this was after Rashaad Penny managed to run 80 total yards on a gain that ended up being 30 yards. See, Penny ran right and was about to be tackled, then turned and ran left and found open field. He then split Packers defenders before basically tripping himself. Oh, and Seattle won even though Russell Wilson caught a pass for negative-11 yards. Seattle does weird things. Like these next two games against the Packers.

Fail Mary!

During Russell Wilson’s third game of his career he basically outplayed Aaron Rodgers, but that was because Rodgers was sacked 8 times by a great Seattle defense. Proving that quarterback rating is basically useless sometimes, Rodgers had a QBR of 81.5 though he was 26 of 39 for 223 yards. Wilson’s QBR was 99.3 but completed just 10 of 21 passes for 130 yards. He had 2 touchdowns, though. Including the final play.

Forever known as the Fail Mary, Wilson dropped back to pass, threw the ball into the endzone where well over 3,000 players seemingly waited for the ball. Seahawks receiver Golden Tate went up and “caught” the ball, though the Packers argued they actually intercepted it. Seattle won. Just shows that a defender should knock the ball down instead of trying to catch it.

NFC Championship game 2014

In a miracle win for the Seahawks that allowed them to move on to the Super Bowl where they didn’t run Marshawn Lynch near the goal line versus the Patriots, the following craziness happened.

Seattle trailed 16-0 until 4:44 was left in the third quarter when Seattle faked a field goal and punter Jon Ryan threw a touchdown pass to Garry Gilliam. With 2:09 left in the 4th quarter and trailing 19-7, Wilson runs the ball in from the one to make it 19-14. Then Seattle tries an onside kick which hits a Packer right in the hands but bounces off and Seahawk Chris Matthews recovers.

With 1:25 left, Lynch runs the ball in from 24 yards and Seattle somehow has a lead. But then on the 2-point conversion, Wilson is flushed to his right, spins around, throws it way up in the air to his left and across the field where tight end Luke Willson is waiting on the ball, catches it and runs it in for 2. Green bay answers by driving for a game-tying field goal to force the game into overtime.

During the game, Wilson has thrown 4 interceptions. Two of them were not his fault as they bounced off receiver Jermaine Kearse’s hands and into Packer hands. So who does Wilson trust with a deep pass in the middle of the field to win the game? Kearse, of course, who catches it and Seattle wins.

My point in all this is that if the Seahawks are to beat the Packers on Sunday, expect strange things to happen. In fact, hope for it. Because the weirder the game unfolds the better the chance is that Seattle wins.