Didn’t you enjoy yourself?!

You were probably at least a little frustrated that the Seattle Seahawks dropped a 42-29 thriller to the Detroit Lions. It’s the fourth year in a row that this game has turned into a shootout, but this time the Lions were able to beat Seattle. This would have been a difficult task even without the injuries, but the Seahawks held on bravely thanks to an excellent performance by the offense.

Seattle isn’t going to go 20-0, so roll with it. Besides the negatives, there were a lot of positives in this one, so let’s get to Winners and Losers!

Winners

Geno Smith

I don’t care about the late-game interception on a losing cause (although I do care about some of the chance throws early in that quarter). Smith did everything he could to win that match and he was sensational. It’s a shame he doesn’t run an offense that would pass the ball heavily at the 1-yard line so he could get some more touchdown passes. I don’t think the 4 TD/4 INT ratio does him justice.

Smith was statistically brilliant (38/56 for 395 yards) and did so under heavy pressure. Aidan Hutchinson had ten pressures of his own and did everything but a sack. Geno made phenomenal plays on the run, scrambling out of danger and making accurate passes, doing “top-10 quarterback” type things all night.

It’s a shame that too many of Smith’s best performances have also come during some of Seattle’s worst defensive games.

Ryan Grubb

I’m a little worried about how heavy the script was in the first half, but I’m really happy with his adjustments in the second half and his overall delivery. Pull a lateral play to get out of 3rd and 16? Brilliant. Aggressively attack coverage of men in Detroit? Smart. More mid-range targets for the likes of Jake Bobo, Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Noah Fant? I love it. A fencing pass that actually gained more than 5 meters? He could be a magician. Seattle had 38 first downs. 38! More than 500 meters of violation!

Grubb is also still learning his way around NFL coordination. That was the best we’ve seen the offense through four weeks, and the passing game really looks like it could develop into one of the best in the NFL with only marginally better pass protection. I’m excited. That’s my biggest positive from tonight’s loss.

Kenneth Walker III

Welcome back, K9. The only thing you could say is that he didn’t get the ball anymore. He had 16 touches for 116 yards and 3 touchdowns, and his most impressive play was this ridiculous flip off his back for a first down. You’ll live with his occasional -6 yard runs where he’s too hard to tackle for his own good if it means he delivers ridiculous highlight plays.

Jaxon Smith-Njigba

JSN had only 51 yards receiving. He also had 8 catches, five of which were first downs. If it hadn’t been there, there would have been six That OPI on Tyler Lockett. I know we haven’t seen him as a deep ball option yet, but he’s moving the damn chains, which delights me. Bobby Engram crossed with Tyler Lockett would be a great receiver.

DK Metcalf

I’ll be a little hesitant to bring DK in here. His seven catches for 104 yards make him the first Seahawk in franchise history to achieve a trifecta of 100 yards receiving games. That lost fumble was costly, though, and it’s something he’s done a few times before when trying to fight for extra yards. The questionable OPI on Tyler Lockett probably doesn’t happen without his holding penalty, which got a Zach Charbonnet wiped out first two times before. Metcalf has five penalties and they are all arrests or OPI.

That said, I can’t deny that he’s put work into making the heavier sideline moves that he’s struggled with in recent years. His fumble on the opening play of Seattle’s first drive was sensational. On the unfortunate side, I’m convinced Metcalf caught that ball during the two-point conversion, and was certainly stymied in the end zone late in the game.

Jake Bobo

More Bobo! His blocking was solid and he caught three passes for 30 yards and was just a yard from the end zone on one of his catches.

A. J. Barner

The rookie showcased his receiving skills with his first NFL touchdown. On the night he had a pair of grabs for 27 yards, and as a bit of a skeptic about his draft selection, he’s coming into his own in this offense as a blocker and receiver.

Derik Hall

My only defensive winner of the night. Hall’s development as a pass rusher has been unreal. This one-armed throw from Goff for his fourth sack of the season was a move from a grown man. I’m really happy with how he’s looking so far, and his jump in year two could be as big as Boye Mafe’s, if not bigger.

Anthony Bradford

No fine committed. Hang up the banner! I’ll assess the offensive line more intently later this week during the All-22 review.

Losers

The entire defense

I can understand those of you who took offense with “thoroughly humiliated” in the headline of the final score summary. I stand by it. I’m fully aware of the injuries to the defensive line and how that put the Seahawks in a bad position, so I knew this was going to be a struggle.

That was still one of the most efficient offensive performances allowed in modern NFL history. By no standards was that a remotely decent showing. Giving up 42 points in 50 plays and only forcing six third downs while averaging almost eight yards per play allowed is atrocious. According to Stathead, only six teams in NFL history had ever scored at least 40 points in 50 plays or fewer without a defensive or special teams touchdown. In total, only 41 teams had achieved 42 points in no more than 50 games, regardless of conditions, a total of well over 1,000 instances in decades of football.

While the missing starters were significant, most of those same starters were present for the 180-plus yards allowed against the New England Patriots rushing attack. It’s still a major problem for the defensive line and linebackers and needs to be addressed quickly given some of the offenses they face.

Dre’Mont Jones has a large contract and apart from his dismissal, he was anonymous again for safety reasons (in pseudo-garbage time). Technically, he’s a starter and will at least get big shots. Devon Witherspoon is not a backup and he was carried by David Montgomery and may also have had some sort of coverage breakdown on Jameson Williams’ touchdown and Amon-Ra St. Brown’s touchdown. Jarran Reed is technically a starter over Byron Murphy II and was the starter last season. He had a sack and there wasn’t much to talk about after that.

Tyrel Dodson? Starting linebacker. Was caught out of position repeatedly and couldn’t stop David Montgomery at the goal line for a touchdown.

The starters who were available and some of the regular reserves who get playing time helped with that performance. It wasn’t just Myles Adams, Quinton Bohanna and Tyus Bowser. If this same scenario had occurred under Pete Carroll, I don’t think he would have been granted the same forgiveness, at least not recently. I’m not mad at Mike Macdonald; this is just a serious assessment of what i saw. It won’t be this bad again (I hope), but I can’t help but be disappointed that it was so easy overall for the Lions to cut them to pieces.

Trevis Gipson

I think I’ve seen enough of Gipson to wonder whether or not he’ll be on the roster after Uchenna Nwosu is ready to play and Seattle gets one of their several players back from IR or PUP. For all my criticism of Darrell Taylor, he never looked that overmatched, and he is at least ten times the athlete Gipson. The missed tackle and facemask combination was brutal, as were his attempts against the run and on the trick play TD against Goff.

On duty

This is not a complaint about “the referees were biased against the Seahawks.” Seattle had six first downs through penalties and had a ton of calls against the Lions secondary, especially rookie Terrion Arnold. I didn’t like the offensive pass interference call against Tyler Lockett, but I understand why it was called because Lockett didn’t really disguise that as a route.

The fact that Metcalf’s two-point conversion is not automatically reviewed is a mistake. The DPI he didn’t get was ridiculous, but I’d probably argue the DPI in his favor on that two-point conversion was questionable.

Unfortunately, nine more penalties for the Seahawks tonight. You can’t say that most of them weren’t justified.

Final comments

• The special teams return game continues to hurt the Seahawks. Forget Jason Myers’ miss, because that was a gamble; Dee Williams had a good punt return and a kick return that was called back on penalties for Tre Brown and Dareke Young, respectively. It’s just not a good unit right now.
• Hopefully Julian Love’s injury is not serious. He left with a bruise and now the bruises are piling up for the Seahawks. They’re looking for bruises.
• No problem if Mike Macdonald goes for 2 down at 28-20. The idea behind this is that if you don’t convert, you are still left with one asset, but if you do convert, you can take the lead by making the higher percentage PAT. In other words, go for two when there is more room for error to make up for not converting than, say, if the game comes down to a two-point conversion in a one-point game. I also appreciate him going deep into his own territory to start the second half.
• I think a visit from Daniel Jones will be a welcome sight for a defense that may still be without key players. Keeping in mind the short week against the San Francisco 49ers on Thursday, there could be some degree of load management at play against a fairly weak New York Giants offense whether Malik Nabers plays or not. I’m much more concerned about that OL against Dexter Lawrence, though.
• As long as the Seahawks take care of business against the Giants, they enter Week 6 with the NFC West lead and a 4-1 record. I’ll gladly accept that if it becomes a reality.