For Pete's Sake: 5 critical observations from Seattle Seahawks Week 6 loss

The Seahawks front seven did more than enough to win

Now, I'm not about to compare a three-sack performance to the mind-boggling 11 sacks the Hawks put up two weeks ago versus the Giants. Still, after the first two drives, they put enough pressure on Burrow to shut the Bengals offense down. On those first two drives, Burrow completed 13 of 15 passes for 123 yards. That's not exactly winning football. After that, though, he was just 11 of 20 for 62 yards. He had a clean pocket on those scoring drives. After that, the Seahawks sacked him three times and put him on the ground on five more plays. No, not exactly the numbers they put up against New York, but it was certainly enough to win the game.

Jarran Reed, Dre'Mont Jones, and Boye Mafe all had one sack, one QB hit, and one tackle for a loss. Nice to see another Dre'Mont sighting, as those were just his second sacks and quarterback hits of the season. As for Jarran Reed, he is playing like a force of nature. Good grief, man. Another testament to the effectiveness of the Seattle pass rush is the low average yards per catch. On the first two drives, the Bengals averaged 9.5 yards per catch. After the Hawks tightened the screws, Burrow averaged just 5.6 yards per catch. The only time Cincinnati scored in the final 47:40 of the game was a four-play "drive" of zero yards, after Geno Smith's second pick of the game.

As for the rushing defense, I suppose you could say they came through as well. The Bengals ran the ball 15 times and managed just 46 yards. Yes, that's a slight improvement on the 3.18 yards per carry Seattle had allowed through the first four games. Cincinnati running back Joe Mixon came into the game averaging just under four yards per carry and was held to 38 yards on a dozen carries. Not an astounding job by the Hawks, perhaps, but it was Mixon's worst performance of the year. It was also a far cry from Seattle's sieve of a run defense last year.

Sure, you can say the defense shouldn't have spotted the Bengals two touchdowns. I can see that, to a point. I'd prefer to focus on the fact they made adjustments and absolutely shut their opponents down after that. For Pete's Sake, when the defense plays like that, the offense has to come through, too.

More Seattle Seahawks news and analysis