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Brady HendersonESPN
SEATTLE – Russell Wilson’s 2020 season kicked off at a record pace, talking about his first MVP award in his career. It ended abruptly with a thud and a question: What happened to the quarterback and the Seattle Seahawks high-scoring attack that couldn’t be stopped for the first two months?
The Battle for Wilson and Co. culminated on Saturday when the Seahawks lost 30-20 in the Los Angeles Rams’ wildcard round at an empty Lumen Field, breaking the third longest home winning streak in NFL history after the season. The Seahawks had not lost a home game since the 2004 season and had won all six attempts under Pete Carroll before Saturday.
“I hate this feeling,” said Wilson after the game, still without a shower two hours after the final whistle.
Wilson threw for 174 yards, two touchdowns, and an interception that was returned for a Rams score. His 40.7% completion rate on 11-of-27 passes was level for the second lowest of his career, while his 17.6 total QBR was his worst in 16 playoff games of his career, according to research from ESPN Stats & Information.
It didn’t help that he was fired or put under duress for half of his dropbacks, even with All-Pro defensive tackle Aaron Donald on the sidelines for much of the second half. The 50% pressure percentage of the Rams was the highest that Wilson has experienced this season and the second highest he has experienced in the playoffs. He was fired five times.
“Of course they did well. They got me a few times,” said Wilson. “I don’t think we just played our best game for us. We weren’t busy with our stuff as much as we needed to.”
Carroll didn’t blame Wilson for his second-quarter pick-six, which came after a screen-fitting attempt to DK Metcalf who read cornerback Darious Williams perfectly.
“I thought it was very difficult,” said Carroll of Wilson’s afternoon. “They make the fantastic interception for a touchdown, which is a great game for the kid. He took a shot and got it, and that was a big game in this game, because it was coming up all the time, those seven points. “No fault at all from Russ. That’s just a great game of theirs. But it was tough. When you get so rushed, get fired five times against that group, it’s just hard.”
Wilson was also fired five times when the Seahawks beat the Rams 20-9 in Week 16 to win the NFC West.
“This is no surprise,” said Carroll. “This is how they played against other people. We had to keep this game like we played last time, where we kept it low, where they scored nine points and we found a way to score twenty.”
Wilson threw an NFL-record-draw 16 touchdown passes through the first four games as he established himself as the league-leader for MVP early in the season. For the first nine weeks, Seahawks’ attack led the league with 34 points per game, while Wilson led the league with 28 touchdown passes. But in the last eight weeks of the regular season, Seattle’s average points-per-game dropped to 22.6 (that was 16th), while Wilson threw 12 TD passes (equal to 13th).
His average yards per attempt went from 8.56 yards (fourth) to 6.4 (28th). He also averaged 6.4 yards per attempt on Saturday.
Carroll lamented that the Seahawks were not adapting better to the way opponents defended their deep passes in the play-action game, traditionally a big part of Seattle’s offensive success.
“That doesn’t mean we throw the ball over their heads all the time and only get bombs,” Carroll said. “But there is a lot of space that we create in the play-passing game, and it seemed that we had hit so early during the season, mid-game, that we had been so effective that people had a way of getting behind. to stay and just try to bleed and let us throw the ball underneath, and we maybe really went for it more than we needed to and didn’t use the shifting a little bit there as effectively as we would like. ”
Wilson’s 40 touchdown passes and 13 regular season interceptions were both career highlights.
The veteran pointed to injuries along the attack line as a reason for the Seahawks’ battle following their hot start. They had their preference for starting five of Duane Brown, Mike Iupati, Ethan Pocic, Damien Lewis and Brandon Shell for their first four games, but only one other time in the second half.
But those first five were back together on Saturday, and it was no match for the Rams defensive front … with or without Donald. The Rams generated six presses and two sacks after Donald left with just over 10 minutes to go in the third quarter.
Seven of the Seahawks’ nine accepted punishments were against the offense, with five on their line of attack. One got off to a false start in the fourth quarter when Seattle broke the group late – despite having extra time as Lewis was being examined for an injury on the field – and rushed to get a fourth-and-1 play in time . . The Seahawks then kicked.
Carroll said they were talking about plays and he was in the thick of it, adding to the delay. He said he didn’t mind punting after the penalty as that was initially a consideration.
Wilson threw both of his touchdown passes to Metcalf against a standard four-man pass rush, but was only 8 of 18 for 130 yards on those plays. His 44.4% completion rate against standard pressure was his lowest in a match since week 15 of the 2017 season against the Rams (44.0%), according to research from ESPN Stats & Information.
The Seahawks were only 2-of-14 in third behind, starting 0-for-8 for their first conversion with less than four minutes to go in the third quarter. They ran 136 meters on 25 attempts.
“I wish we had found the way to run the ball more, to slow it down and keep it from rushing us,” said Carroll. “… When Donald went out, we wanted to try and throw the ball into the pass rush without him and we couldn’t get out enough.”
The Seahawks won 12 regular season games for the first time since 2014 and won the NFC West for the first time since 2016.
“We have a great soccer team. Don’t get me wrong,” said Wilson. “You can write whatever you want, but the reality is we have a great soccer team and I think we have guys, but we didn’t play great today. That’s the most important thing.”
This marked the second time in three seasons that the Seahawks have been bounced back in the wildcard round and the fifth time in their past five trips to the playoffs that they have been left behind in the NFC title game.
“We’ll heal, but it’s a shame because these years are hard to come by,” Carroll said. “It’s hard to have 12 wins. It’s hard to find a playoff game at home. We’ve won a lot of playoff games at home and it’s hard to give one away. We’ve won them all. Playoff games With a raw, wild, crazy fan base, and not today, we needed you. I wish we could have had you. That’s no excuse, that’s just a shame. “