4 winners and losers from the Seattle Seahawks Week 3 victory over the Panthers
By Lee Vowell
Winner No. 3 - Offensive coordinator Shane Waldron
Shane Waldron got a lot more creative as the game went on. In all honesty, I might write that at times and mean it in a negative sense. But when it comes to Week 3, I believe what Waldron did was extremely positive. The main reason for this is he adjusted not only to what the Panthers were trying to do against his offense, but Waldron also adjusted to the personnel he had available to him.
Seattle came into the game still missing both of their starting offensive tackles, Charles Cross and Abraham Lucas. As in Week 2, Stone Forsythe and Jake Curhan started in place of Cross and Lucas. To begin the game, Forsythe struggled and gave up 3 hits on Geno Smith and 2 sacks. Curhan was once again solid, however.
Seattle also didn't have right guard Phil Haynes against the Panthers as well. Some offensive coordinators might have decided to go with an extremely conservative game plan because they couldn't really be sure how the blocking was going to hold up. Waldron, however, went with a ton of sets where he had two tight ends in the backfield and this helped create holes for Kenneth Walker, especially, in the second half.
Because of the sets that Waldron was using, the Panthers had to adjust and this opened the left side of the field more for Geno Smith and his receivers. It also allowed Smith to have more time to throw and even get the ball to tight end Colby Parkinson on rub routes. In other words, Shane Waldron was very likely the main reason the Seahawks offense was so successful in the second half of Week 3.