The Seattle Seahawks fell flat against Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 10 in Germany, a game in that we witnessed Geno Smith and the Seahawks offense struggle for the first time in a long while this season. Now the Seahawks go on their bye and try to regroup and re-focus towards the stretch drive and try to make the playoffs.
It was a frustrating game to watch but we give credit to the Bucs defense for making it tough for the Seahawks to move the ball over. However, the Bucs were not as good as a team this year compared to the past 2 seasons, and with their own struggles and the Seahawks still had no answer for them last Sunday.
Luckily for the Seahawks, they head over to their bye, get refreshed and heal up and be ready for Week 12.
Three thoughts from the Seahawks Week 10 loss
The defeat dropped the Seahawks’ record back to 6-4 but still lead the NFC West division by a small margin over the 49ers. This loss serves as a wake-up call and learning experience for the relatively young Seahawks team which will bode well for them in the long run. We will see how this team responds to this setback after enjoying 4 straight weeks of winning.
With the regular season dwindling down and the playoffs in sight, the Seattle Seahawks still have a lot of work to do in order to reach that goal. Now we look at what happened last Sunday in Germany for the Seahawks.
The Seahawks anemic run game
This is not a bash against Seattle Seahawks running back Kenneth Walker, he is still a great player and a fantastic runner. This is just a reminder to all of us and Seattle that no matter how good a running back you are, you can run into a brick wall sometimes.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers did just that last Sunday in Germany as Ken Walker run into Berlin Wall time and again against the Bucs run defense. K9 had 10 carries for a woeful 17 rush yards on this game, to say that it was a terrible run game for the Seahawks will be a massive understatement.
The silver lining for Ken Walker’s horrendous run game was his utilization in the passing game, wherein he caught 6 passes for 55 receiving yards. The head-scratcher was, seeing how the Bucs were stone-walling Walker for the first 3 quarters and yet the Seahawks did not use him in the passing game up until the 4th quarter. It was mind-numbing that most of the yardage Walker was able to accumulate was towards the later part of the 4th quarter when the Seahawks were mounting a comeback.
Ken Walker proved in this game that he is a more than capable pass-catcher back, and the Seahawks must take advantage of this skillset as other teams will surely game plan towards stopping Ken Walker and their run game.
The Seahawks comeback fell short
Geno Smith was having a tough time moving the ball against the Bucs last Sunday with the Seahawks running game ineffective for the entire game. It was three and out after three and out as Seattle was only able to convert 1 of 9 3rd down opportunities. Geno Smith was having a fine season with regard to his passing efficiency but this game was very different compared to his previous 4 weeks of success.
Even with his struggles for much of this game, Geno was able to find his grove in the 4th quarter as the Seahawks were trying to mount a comeback. Geno Smith was able to guide the Seahawks to consecutive scoring drives to move them to within 5 points late in the 4th quarter.
The comeback fell short, however, as Seattle could not stop the Buccaneers to move the ball as they try to ice the game at the end. Still, a courageous effort from Geno Smith as he finished the game with 275 passing yards to go along with his 2 passing touchdowns late in the fourth quarter. The resiliency Geno and the Seahawks are showing makes them a tough opponent to face later this season and when they make the playoffs.
Seahawks D missing
For the first half of this game, especially in the 2nd quarter, Seattle’s defense was missing in action. They looked lost out there in Germany, maybe it was the time change, or maybe it was the more than 10 gazillion miles of air travel, who knows but they got demolished out there.
When Seattle was winning all those games, they were able to somehow shut the other teams down, but in this game, they somehow forgot to play defense. Early in the 2nd quarter, they allowed a 50-year-old wide receiver in Julio Jones to waltz his way to the endzone for the first touchdown of the game. Then later proceeded to allow the Bucs and Leonard Fournette to score on the ground. Two scoring plays, both long drives of identical 13 plays and 85 plus yards.
This Seahawks team simply cannot allow their opponents to gain sustainable drives against them just like in the early part of their season. As good as Geno has been for this team, and this is not a disrespect to Geno, he is not the type of quarterback that can mount a big comeback.
Yes, Geno Smith, in this game was able to guide the offense to inch closer. But they simply cannot fall behind by 2 scores all the time if they plan to make some noise towards the end of the season and the playoffs when they get there.