As odd as it may seem, the Seattle Seahawks through eight weeks of the NFL season are in first place in the NFC West. I don't mean to imply that Seattle isn't a pretty decent team because they are. But the way the San Francisco 49ers began the season, it appeared that maybe the 49ers wouldn't lose. Now they've lost three straight.
Meanwhile, Seattle keeps winning the games they should win. Three times this year the Seahawks have faced a team starting what is really a backup quarterback and Seattle has won all three. This is somewhat different from many previous years when backup quarterbacks, such as Colt McCoy, seemed to thrive against Seattle.
Seattle's Week 8 victory over the Cleveland Browns wasn't beautiful. Seattle won 24-20 by scoring a touchdown with less than a minute left. But in the NFL, a team will take any victory it can. Here are some winners and losers for Seattle from Week 8.
Seattle Seahawks winner No. 1 - Edge rusher Boye Mafe
Mafe got another sack on Sunday, his fifth straight game with a sack. That now stands as the franchise record. Mafe is making good on the promise he showed all the way back in the 2022 preseason. Last year as a rookie, Mafe didn't really have a chance to prove how good he could be as he lost snaps to Darrell Taylor. In training camp this year, though, Mafe leaped past Taylor to become a starter at one edge spot.
Against Cleveland, Mafe was in on 8 tackles, had a tackle for loss, 4 quarterback hits, and the one sack. He continuously pushed whoever was attempting to block him into the backfield. Mafe is fast for his size, but he is also extremely strong. Plus, he is still only 24 years old and his technique will continue to get better as well.
Through Week 7, Mafe was tied for the league lead (along with Cleveland Browns' beast of an edge rusher, Myles Garrett) in pass rush win rate at 31 percent. After Seattle's Week 8 victory and with the 4 quarterback hits, Mafe's number will likely rise. He currently leads the Seahawks in sacks (5), quarterback hits (9), and is tied for the lead in tackles for loss (6).
Loser No. 1 - Offensive play-calling
Overall, I think Shane Waldron is a very good offensive coordinator. He does seem to limit his own creativity at times, though. Against the Detroit Lions in Week 2, for instance, Waldron found a way to align his tight ends in 12 personnel where that augmented the rush a lot more. But sometimes he gets almost a little too basic.
The other concern I have is that at times the Seahawks get too pass-happy. Seattle does seem to get stuffed quite a bit in hopes of Kenneth Walker getting a long run or two, but sometimes Walker just doesn't get enough opportunities. Against the Browns, Walker was handed the ball just 8 times. Seattle ran just 17 times total, but two of those were scrambles by Geno Smith, and one was a sweep with Dee Eskridge. One was also a handoff to Jake Bobo but that resulted in a touchdown and was more a straight-ahead rush.
Cleveland does have a good defense, but when a team drops back to throw 40 times (Smith threw 37 passes, was sacked once, and scrambled twice) and only runs the ball 15 times, that's making things easier for the defense because they have a better idea of what an offense is going to do.
Plus, the run was working fairly well for Seattle. Walker had 8 carries for 66 yards while Zach Charbonnet ran 5 times for 53 yards. Combined Walker and Charbonnet had an average rush of 9.2 yards per carry. Walker and Charbonnet needed the ball more and that might have helped Geno Smith a bit more too.
Winner No. 2 - Punter Michael Dickson
Let's give punter Michael Dickson some more love. Dickson might actually be too consistently good at his job because many might be getting numb to how fantastic he is. He is the NFL's all-time leader in yards-per-punt (47.8). In 2023, Dickson is third in yards-per-punt (51.1) and is second in net yards per punt (45.4).
Against the Browns, though, Dickson started the day with back-to-back 60-yard punts. His long on the day was 67. He punted the ball five times for an average of 54.8 yards per punt and had two punts downed inside the Browns' 20-yard line.
The thing with Dickson, compared to other lesser mortals, is that he not only has the ability to punt the ball really far, he very rarely outpunts his coverage. The ball goes long, but it also goes really high. When Michael Dickson was chosen in 2018, the idea was he would be a defensive weapon and he has never disappointed. In times past, the defense hasn't been able to take advantage of Dickson pinning teams back deep in their own territory, but this is beginning to change.
Dickson is currently having the best year of his career. His previous high for yards per punt was 49.6 in 2020. His previous high in net yards per punt was 44.4 (in 2020 and 2022). Yet thankfully, he is averaging 5.0 yards per punt, which is the lowest of his career. The low number means the offense is working a bit more efficiently.
Winner No. 3 - Linebacker Jordyn Brooks
The Seattle Seahawks are getting to be in a bad spot with Jordyn Brooks. After rightfully not picking up his fifth-year option for 2024 ahead of the 2022 season - Brooks was good but not yet great and paying him $12 million next year seemed like a lot - Brooks then suffered a major knee injury late last year.
Expecting Brooks to come back early in 2023 appeared to be a reach this past February. With the type of knee injury Brooks had, normally a player doesn't fully regain their speed for a year. The hope was maybe Brooks could be somewhat productive by November. But Brooks had other ideas and made it back fully healthy for Week 1 and he has been fantastic all year.
Against the Browns, Brooks had 2 quarterback hits, a sack, a forced fumble, and was in on 10 tackles. He was blazing fast when pressuring the quarterback, and he is getting those kinds of opportunities more this year than in his previous three seasons. He already has set a career high with 3.5 sacks in 2023 (his previous career high was just 1 sack and that happened in 2021 and 2022). He's also set a career high with 4 quarterback hits. He has 6 tackles for loss which is the second-best number of his career.
Jordyn Brooks isn't just having a surprisingly productive year after coming back from knee surgery, but he's having a career year. He will be an unrestricted free agent after 2023, however. Hopefully, Seattle will find a way to bring him back, but he is going to be expensive.