What we learned from the Seahawks Week 2 bludgeoning to 49ers

Uchenna Nwosu is for real, but he still needs a partner in crime.

Now, for all that hand-wringing over the run defense, for the second week in a row Uchenna Nwosu has looked the part in the pass rush. He hit the QB three separate times, deflected a pass, and has generally looked like the best player on Seattle’s defense to open the season. At the bargain-bin price Seattle got him at relative to the rest of the pass rusher market, there’s some Chris Clemons in his game.

We still have yet to see anyone really create pressure from the other side, though. Darrell Taylor has looked completely lost in the pass rush thus far, and now in his third year and 25 years old, one would expect him to be quite a bit further along.

Boye Mafe turned in a respectable performance, picking up a sack and four tackles, including one stuff, so there’s a chance that simply tossing him into the fire as a rookie might not be the worst idea. As raw an athlete as he is, we’ve seen before how much Carroll seems to prefer his veterans to his youth when it comes to the pass rush.

This is evidenced by his utter refusal to play Alton Robinson in any regard in the last two seasons (he was on the injured reserve list this week, for anyone curious), contrasted with starting the feckless Benson Mayowa for entirely too long.

But whatever Carroll or defensive coordinator Clint Hurtt decide to do, someone has to step up and keep Nwosu from catching every double-team and chip block the opposing offense can throw at him, or else it’s going to be another long season for the Seahawks’ front seven, who have lacked an impactful pass rush ever since the Legion of Boom broke up.