NFC West
State of the Seahawks
By Travis Laver
Feb 24, 2007, 16:45

State of the Seahawks Review

This was going to be “THE” season for the Seahawks. They were supposed to turn the experience of a Super Bowl appearance the previous season into a stepping stone to a championship. Unfortunately, the Madden curse and across the board injuries took their toll on the ‘hawks. Had the guys in the Emerald City done their research they would have heard of the Superbowl runner-up curse, which states “unless you are the Buffalo Bills, you don’t go to the Superbowl and lose and then make a return appearance the next year.” One other nasty curse reared its ugly head this year for the Seahawks, that being the Madden curse. While Madden may be as big a doofus as there is in the football broadcasting business, his curse packs a pretty mean punch. Just ask any player featured on the cover of the Madden football game since 1999 how their season went that year. The answer is BAD for all involved. The list includes Michael Vick, Donovan McNabb and now…..Shaun Alexander. A busted foot put the brakes on Shaun’s encore to his MVP season. Lest anyone think my articles are simply gloom and doom, I will say that all things considered, this really was a remarkable coaching job by Mike Holmgren and his staff. The sheer number of injuries on this team was almost unbelievable. One has to wonder if the Seahawks possibly borrowed some training equipment from Cleveland. Just your basic leg-breaking apparatus or maybe one of those ACL tearing gadgets the Browns are famous for, or better yet, maybe Kellen Winslow Jr. opened a Kawasaki dealership in the great northwest. 9-7 is not a bad record for a team that, at times during the season, was one DB injury away from being demoted to the PAC-10. This team very nearly beat the Bears in the playoffs in front of a very hostile crowd in less than optimal conditions, which makes them the runners-up to the team that got stomped in the second half of the Super Bowl. So what is the status of Seahawk nation this offseason?

Negatives:

The offense only continues to get older. Matt Hasselbeck has been bald since 7th grade, but the problem now is that he has a legitimate reason to be bald, he is OLD. At 31, his clock is ticking and that accurate, but not so strong arm is getting weaker by the hour. Even the west coast offense can only hide that for so long. Injuries took time out of Hasselbeck’s season for the first significant amount of time in his career. Shaun Alexander is reaching that no-no age for running backs, don’t tell him or the Seattle faithful, but he is almost 30 and we all know what that means, an almost categorical drop in production. The good new is that the offensive line began the transition to younger players this year. Center Robbie Tobeck made way, albeit through injury and subsequent retirement, for the new guy Chris Spencer and it looks as though Chris Gray is nearing his last go round also. Walt Jones does seem to have a few trips left on his tires though. Floyd Womack has a great nickname (Pork Chop) but never seems to be there when the team really needs him (this coming from a guy who watched him maul every one of the high caliber D-linemen and linebackers in the SEC for 4 years at Mississippi State). Luckily Deion Branch, Darrell Jackson and Nate Burleson are all young bucks who have plenty of years left. Jerramy Stevens is young, but he doesn’t seem to understand that when the ball is thrown to you, you need to first catch it and second shut-up and run. Instead, he likes to run his mouth and try to touch the nether regions of every Raider that gets near him.

Positives:

The defense has a solid young nucleus that should pay dividends in the years to come. The Seahawks have done very well with their defensive picks in the last few years. Of course. this goes without saying when Tatupu goes to Hawaii his first two years in the league. Julian Peterson is a terror coming off the edge, and when healthy the DBs are solid. A little help on the DL would put this defense up with the elite.
The fans in Seattle are second to none when it comes to providing a home-field advantage. I have never been affected by fans when trying to watch an NFL game (even though this happens all the time in college games), but several times this year I couldn’t pay attention to the play because I was so amazed at how loud the crowd was. Now there were some accusations of crowd noise being pumped in via the PA system, but we will leave that debate for another time.
If the offense can avoid the injuries associated with an aging roster or at least space them out, then it should improve over last year. Deion Branch will be more comfortable and should return to his status as one of the best in the game, including EFS. The summer should provide Homgren and his offensive assistants time to better integrate Branch into the gameplan, which will pay dividends for both the Hawks and EFS owners who suffered through a pretty lifeless season from Branch last year. This will help the running game and will help free up Jackson and Burleson.

Offseason Needs:

The Seahawks traded their number 1 pick this year to New England for Branch, but the # 24 overall pick never would have brought the immediate impact that Branch can be for this team. The Seahawks do have a few needs in the off-season though. It is rumored that they are unhappy with the inability of Michael Boulware to cover. This has caused serious limitations in what the defense can do, so the team will be looking at acquiring a safety in either free agency or the draft. Further depth in the defensive backfield will be essential. They will also likely look to build depth at tight end, along the offensive line and at outside linebacker. Fullback Mack Strong is also nearing the end of his career and so a replacement for him must be found soon.

Conclusions
In all the Seahawks seem to be in a similar position personnel-wise as at this time last year. The lack of a #1 pick should not hurt the team too bad. With a little luck this is a team that should return to the playoffs and may be able to put together a run at the big game. Seahawks fans should be sure to pray to the injury gods every night if they want to make the trip to Glendale for Super Bowl XLII.

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