Many NFL fans will wake up this morning and look at what Baker Mayfield and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers offense did to the Seattle Seahawks defense in Week 5 and lose respect for Seattle. The story is quite different.
And that is not meant in any way to take away from what Mayfield accomplished at Lumen Field. He was terrific, just as he has been mostly good since he joined the Bucs in 2023. But he also did something no quarterback in NFL history had done in Week 5.
The quarterback completed 29 of his 33 passes for 379 yards and two touchdowns. He was the first QB to ever throw for 375-plus yards and have fewer than five incompletions. While Seattle's defense should be embarrassed by that fact, Mayfield was great nonetheless.
Baker Mayfield was magnificent against the Seattle Seahawks in Week 5
Still, the hope is that the Seahawks defense will revert to its high-quality performances beginning as soon as Week 6. The players Mayfield was facing in Week 5 were a ghost of what Seattle's defense actually looks like.
Safety Julian Love missed the game with a hamstring injury, and so did cornerback Devon Witherspoon with a knee injury. Those two absences alone would have affected what Seattle can do. But during the game, things got much worse. Veteran edge rusher DeMarcus Lawrence was also out.
Edge rusher Derick Hall, who is having a very good season, hurt an oblique muscle and had to be taken out of the game. The same happened to cornerback Riq Woolen, who suffered a concussion. While Woolen has been bad this year, he's still better than his replacement, Nehemiah Pritchett.
Baker Mayfield is the first QB ever to have 375+ Pass Yards and fewer than 5 incompletions in a regular season game pic.twitter.com/tLwhLuVJQz
— NFL on CBS 🏈 (@NFLonCBS) October 5, 2025
In other words, by early in the second half, the Seattle Seahawks were missing three starters in their secondary and two of their top four edge rushers. Baker Mayfield took advantage of the opportunity presented to him, but he was far from facing Seattle's best.
The question in the next couple of games is how healthy Seattle will be. Woolen missing Week 6 might be a safe assumption, as concussions are no joke and players need time to recover. Love, Witherspoon, and Lawrence are not guaranteed to return. Neither is Hall.
The Seattle Seahawks have a bye week in Week 8, but the 3-2 next faces an improved Jacksonville Jaguars team and then a Houston Texans squad that appears to have found its footing after a rough start to the season. If key defensive players don't return soon, Seattle could find itself 3-4.