What were some major observations from Seattle Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith's performance against the San Francisco 49ers in Week 12?
The Seahawks are now 6-5, and could very well be headed to a 6-8 record by the time Week 16 comes around. 12s can hope for the best, of course. But after watching Seattle get smashed by the 49ers just a few weeks after being destroyed by the Ravens, having hope can be difficult.
Seattle just doesn't seem to have the offensive and defensive schemes and talent to matchup against the better teams in the league right now. In fact, Seattle seems to have digressed since 2022 somehow. Turnovers do not help, obviously.
Seattle had two of them in Week 12, including an interception on a Geno Smith pass. Overall, though, how did Smith do against the 49ers?
Geno Smith simply had little time to do much of anything
Geno Smith could make better decisions with the ball many times, and I am not going to try to argue that otherwise. His interception on a pass intended for Tyler Lockett was a thing of ugliness. Lockett was well-covered so I am not sure what Smith hoped the outcome of his toss would be. But while Smith does make mistakes, he also doesn't have a lot of time in which to decide what to do with the ball.
Smith was sacked six times and hit 12 times in Week 12. On a couple of those, could he maybe have thrown the ball away? Possibly. But sometimes it is also just better to eat the ball. 4 of the 49ers' sacks came when the defender started within 4 yards of Geno Smith. That means the 49ers are crunching the line and the Seahawks offensive line simply needs to be a lot quicker to react to the pass rush. Maybe Seattle just doesn't have the talent to do that along the offensive line, though.
The total number of sacks Seattle has allowed this season is misleading. Seattle has given up 27 which is not top-ten in the NFL, but against good teams Seattle doesn't block well - 49ers got 6 sacks in Week 12, Ravens got 4 in Week 9, Bengals got 4 in Week 6. This is an issue with the team overall: Seattle isn't a bad team, but they simply are not good enough to compete with teams that are clearly better than they are, of which there are many.