My mother taught me better than to take pleasure in other people’s pain, but man, was there anyone that didn’t enjoy seeing Bulger get a beating yesterday? I’ve waited for a performance like that against the Rams since we entered the NFC West, and as they said so well in Office Space, “It was everything I thought it could be.”
As I mentioned in the blog preview yesterday, there were a number of reasons to expect a blow out. Long time Seahawks fans know one absolute prerequisite to a Hawks blowout is that nobody is expecting or talking about the possibility of a blowout leading up to the game. If you expect one, you get a performance like we saw against the Saints.
A few things stuck with me about yesterday’s game:
1. Despite the fact that he clearly blew a couple routes yesterday, my mancrush on Nate Burleson is still going strong.
2. If you still have the game on DVR, it’s worth watching Josh Wilson’s vicious block toward the end of the Nate’s return. That one was suhweet!
3. Certain plays need to be yanked from the playbook each year. They are like players who have bad seasons, except it’s MUCH easier to get rid of them. Last year, the draw play was just horrible. This year, it’s the deep fade and the pass to Shaun out of the backfield. How many times are we going to waste a play throwing it deep along the sideline? Our receivers don’t make good plays on the ball. Matt throws it out of bounds at least 30% of the time, and I can’t remember completing one since Joe J left us a couple seasons back. I can only imagine Holmgren keeps calling it because it “looks good in practice.”
I’ve got a clue for you big guy: It looks good in practice because we have possibly the worst DBs on jump balls in all of football. Just ask Larry Fitzgerald and Torry Holt.
Shaun has bricks for hands, and simply cannot reliably catch the ball, especially if it’s over his shoulder. He has some success when it’s a swing pass that he can run up to, but otherwise, throw it out! That’s what Weaver and Morris are for.
4. Either Shaun or Mo need to be nicknamed “Bob.” So we can line them up with Leonard and have the Bob and Weaver backfield. Yes. That was worth my time to write.
5. Jason Babin is *really* small
I was very confused and then very worried when I saw Jason Babin getting all the reps after halftime for Darryl Tapp. He looked like a JV player out there. I think we’re in deep doo-doo if Tapp is every injured. Barraka Atkins was out there a bit, but he’s not having much of an impact.
6. People need to just dial it back with Shaun
This is a guy who nobody really liked when he was playing great. I think we’re seeing years of frustration with his style emptied out now that his performance is not up to snuff. There is no difference in how he is running now compared to 3-4 years ago. He did run noticeably harder in 2005, but that was definitely not his only great season. The real difference is our offensive line. It’s not what it once was. There were a number of plays where Weaver or Morris would run hard into the line and get nothing, but I heard no boos then. Had it been Shaun, I guarantee there would have been. He also got booed a few times when he made two guys miss that his line didn’t block but couldn’t get past the line of scrimmage. That’s just bush league. It feels odd defending the guy because his style has always annoyed me as well, but I hate group think, and that’s all this is.
7. Weaver rocks
He is a great new weapon. People need to gameplan for him now, and I wonder what that will open up elsewhere. I still think we haven’t seen the best out of Marcus Pollard yet.