Seattle Seahawks offense awful again in week 12 loss to Washington

The Seattle Seahawks lost to the Washington Football Team in week 12 17-15 and are now 3-8. The offense once again was the main issue and seems unfixable. Worse, Russell Wilson has been terrible ever since he returned from injury and the problem appears to be more about confidence than his middle finger.

Yes, the Seahawks almost had a chance at a miracle comeback after driving 96 yards for a touchdown on the last drive but Seattle failed on the 2-point conversion. Then on the ensuing onside kick, Seattle recovered on the first try but a penalty was called on the Seahawks. On the second onside attempt, Washington recovered with 15 seconds left and ran one more play to end the game.

The last drive doesn’t mean the rest of what we saw from the Seattle offense didn’t happen. 36 percent of Seattle’s total yards for the game came on their final drive. At one point, Seattle went five straight drives of three and outs.

Seattle Seahawks fall to 3-8 with loss to Washington in week 12

Wilson is making bad decisions, bad reads, not throwing to receivers open in the slot or the middle of the middle, overthrowing receivers on short routes or, as he did on a third down on the first drive of the second half with the score still tied at 9, just makes an errant throw wide. On the play, a pass intended for Gerald Everett, Everett was wide open for an easy first down. Instead, the drive ended in another Michael Dickson punt of which Dickson had 8 on the night.

On the final drive of the night for the Seahawks, Wilson made a horrible decision of taking a sack when he had plenty of time to throw the ball away. It was inconceivable for a player of Wilson’s ability and experience. Yes, the Seahawks did score on the drive and it turned out not to matter, but that play alone showed just how lost Wilson seems to be.

The defense was once again not great but still only gave up 17 points and were left on the field for 41:40 to Seattle’s 18:20. Washington ran 79 plays to Seattle’s 45. While the defense could have been better and not allowed sustained drives (Washington’s real last drive ended in zero points but took 8:37 to do and left Seattle with just a little over 2 minutes left to do anything), an offense that is scoring so few points and cannot sustain drives of their own is making the defense even worse.

But it should be noted that the defense looked more energized than the offense all night. Players like Jordyn Brooks and Jamal Adams and Quandre Diggs were tackling with ferocity and the interior of the defensive line was fairly stout. Many of Washington’s rushing yards came from the tackles out instead of between the guards.

Perhaps the player of the game for the Seahawks was Michael Dickson. He averaged 50 yards on a punt on those 8 attempts with a net of 49 yards a punt. He is the leading all punters in Pro Bowl voting for a reason.

One player who surely isn’t the MVP is DK Metcalf. He wasn’t even targeted in the first half and finished with just 1 catch for 13 yards on 4 targets. Most of the blame is on Wilson for this but a player like Metcalf also needs to find ways to get open.

Either way, this is a lost season for Seattle and changes must be made this offseason to the coaching staff. Surely, Shane Waldron will be relieved of his offensive coordinator duties as much for his bad play design as his inability to help his quarterback be better. But knowing Pete Carroll, Waldron will still be around next year and Seattle will be terrible once again.