The Seattle Seahawks start their 2023 season against the Los Angeles Rams on September 10th at Lumen Field. Overall, Seattle has quite a bit of talent on the roster. But there are some position groups that might be a little worrisome.
I have mentioned three of those potentially underwhelming groups here. One - the unit I begin with - is an easy one that most people can see would be a concern. But there is some potential for being productive there.
The other two might be seen as actual strengths currently. I am not so sure, though. One group that has gotten rave reviews this offseason might be thought of too highly. So here are three position groups 12s might feel a little uneasy about heading into the season.
Seahawks position concern No. 3 - Interior of the defensive line
I will start with the low-hanging fruit. Everyone and their favorite aunt have complained all offseason that the Seahawks did very little to address the problem they had along the defensive line. Of course, this is nearly completely false because Seattle basically revamped the entire group. Al Woods, Poona Ford, and Quinton Jefferson are all gone. In are Dre'Mont Jones, Jarran Reed, Mike Morris, Mario Edwards, Jr., and Cam Young. That's a massive turnover.
But where struggled mightily last year was against the run and we have seen nothing in the preseason so far to show us that the run defense is better. Jarran Reed played a bit in the second preseason game and he got moved around pretty easily by whoever was blocking him. And Seattle threw us a curve and placed Reed at nose tackle. Yet, he's never played the position before so no one can be sure how good he will be.
Jones was a good pro with the Denver Broncos, but not exactly transformative but Seattle paid him the most expensive free agent contract general manager John Schneider and head coach Pete Carroll have ever done. So, he better be really good. Edwards has bounced around the league and Young and Morris are rookies who have missed time already with injuries. This is a boom-or-bust group.
Seahawks position concern No. 2 - Unproven edge rushers
The Seahawks have one edge rusher who has proven to be consistently good over the course of a season. Uchenna Nwosu led Seattle with 26 quarterback hits in 2022, which was 13 more than second-place players Darrell Taylor and Quinton Jefferson. Nwosu's QB hit number was tied for eighth in the NFL so not bad at all, but what is bad is that the next closest in terms of production on his own team was so far behind him. Nwosu also led the team in tackles for loss with 12 and played the run well.
Darrell Taylor can so far only rush the passer (he is awful against the run), but he does that extremely inconsistently. If you take Taylor's first five games of 2021 and combine them with the last six games of 2022 and make that into one season then Taylor would have had 10.5 sacks in 11 games. Good stuff. But the rest of his two seasons combined he has just 4 sacks in 21 games. Plus, he's got an injured shoulder currently and there's no timetable for his return.
That basically leaves Seattle with two potentially good edge rushers. One is Boye Mafe who has been fantastic in the preseason. But he looked pretty good last preseason as well and he wasn't able to accomplish much in the rela games. Hopefully this year he will be different, but even if he is better that means Seattle has likely just two decent edge rushers, but not much depth (assuming Taylor remains in consistent and/or hurt).
Derick Hall was drafted in the second round this year and has the size and speed to be good initially against the run and hopefully supply some pass rush eventually as well. But as we saw with Mafe, it's tough for a rookie edge rusher in the NFL. And Hall hurt his shoulder in preseason Week 3 and he hasn't practiced since.
Seahawks position concern No. 1 - Cornerbacks other than Riq Woolen
12s have heard all offseason since drafting Devon Witherspoon at pick number 5 overall in the 2023 NFL draft how deep the Seahawks cornerback unit - heck, even the entire secondary - is in 2023. There is starting talent and quality depth and playmakers all around. In fact, the group is so deep that 2022 starter Michael Jackson might actually lose his job to Tre Brown, right?
Well, let's press the brakes just a bit. While the secondary wasn't the biggest concern of an underwhelming Seahawks defense in 2022, the pass defense also wasn't perfect. But the 2023 cornerback group might not be as good as hoped.
Many didn't recognize that Jackson actually had a good year in 2022 until after the season was over. Why? Because Jackson is fine in coverage, but he doesn't the ball back for his offense. And Jackson was simply bad in the last preseason games yet still might start over Brown to start the season.
Woolen needs to prove again he can be good - nay, better - than he was in his rookie year. He looked bad against the San Francisco 49ers in the playoffs and while he did have 6 interceptions last year, he had just 2 of them in the last 11 games (and one of those picks came on a pass a running back threw on an attempted pass to the quarterback in Week 10). Is he really as good as he was at the beginning of 2022, or did teams figure him out a bit more late in the year?
Finally, Witherspoon hasn't practiced much at all, and expecting a rookie corner to not get a bunch of reps and still be good at the beginning of his first season seems like foolish thinking. That Seattle plays Cooper Kupp and the Los Angeles Rams in Week 1 also probably doesn't give you that warm fuzzy feeling. My point is that maybe the cornerbacks are good for Seattle, but they also might be extremely disappointing.