What we learned from the Seahawks Week 3 loss to Atlanta

Last week, I compared the Seattle Seahawks‘ performance to a 2009 vintage Jim Mora effort. The offense went nowhere, the defense couldn’t hold anything except their coverage assignments, and Seattle lost one of the uglier games in franchise history.

This week, the Seahawks threw it back to the early aughts, losing a heartbreaker to the Atlanta Falcons in which the offense did all but two things right, and the defense made up for it by doing just about everything wrong.

Much in reverse of what many Seahawks fans would have predicted going into the season, the  offense was diverse and effective and moved the ball at every opportunity. It was everything else that was the problem. Much like the early-aughts squads featuring Matt Hasselbeck and Shaun Alexander, it was the defense that couldn’t stand up to a stiff breeze.

What did we learn about the Seahawks in their Week 3 loss?

Those 2003 and 2004 squads were the first Seahawks teams I can remember watching and watching the Falcons sling the ball all over the yard and run roughshod over Seattle’s front seven brought back memories of watching the Orlando Huffs and D.D. Lewises of the world be completely helpless to stop what was still the Greatest Show on Turf at that point.

For a day, the Seahawks let Marcus Mariota become Kurt Warner, and Cordarrelle Patterson morphed into Marshall Faulk.

So, what’s wrong with Seattle’s defense, how does it compare to the days of Seahawks past, and can it be fixed? Well, where do we start?