The Seattle Seahawks have found themselves where no one wants to be after Week 1: talking about silver linings. It’s not the team, necessarily; most quotes you’ll see from the players acknowledge that they didn’t play nearly well enough to beat the rival San Francisco 49ers.
That’s true, for the most part. Because it’s not as though the Seahawks proved themselves to be one of the worst teams in the NFL out of the gate; they lost uncomfortably, but it was a tight loss nonetheless.
So the Seahawks don’t need to bury the tape; they need to learn, build, and grow from the experience. That means taking the good with the bad, and there was one really good aspect that head coach Mike Macdonald’s defense can lean on throughout the season.
Amid the struggles, the Seahawks uncovered a defensive strength to trust
According to NFL Next Gen Stats, the Seahawks defense put more pressure on Brock Purdy than any NFL defense has in his three-year career. Seattle’s pass rush pressured Purdy on 57.9% of his dropbacks.
There’s no question, getting after quarterbacks with that kind of frequency leads to good things, even if the opposition handles it well. After all, Purdy completed 13 of 20 passes, including a touchdown, under pressure. However, he also ate a sack and tossed up both of his interceptions with the Seahawks' defensive front closing in.
Still, that one sack came on a blitz from Julian Love against play action. Naturally, getting home more often, especially with the defensive front, is the next step.
Pressuring nearly 60% of passes with just one sack is a stalemate result, and one that Macdonald can’t be completely pleased with after Seattle picked up 45 sacks a year ago. Still, Seattle proved its pass-rushing unit is formidable and dangerous. When Uchenna Nwosu is finally ready to go, it’ll get another boost then, too.
Seattle has an easy path to building on this success in Week 2 against DK Metcalf and the Pittsburgh Steelers as well. Although Aaron Rodgers had a great debut for Pittsburgh with four touchdown passes and the win, the New York Jets had the 41-year-old QB under heavy pressure for most of the game. The Jets had four sacks in the season opener, three of which came through left tackle Broderick Jones.