Scouts Inc. publishes early scouting reports for each NFL game on ESPN.com on Wednesday’s. While reading this week’s preview of the Seahawks @ Broncos match-up (requires Insider subscription), it became abundantly clear where national perception is lagging behind the new Seahawks reality.
Here’s a sampling of some comments that caught my attention:
Seattle may try to be physical with him to disrupt the timing of [Eddie Royal’s] routes.
Seattle’s secondary is an area of weakness and there isn’t great depth with that group.
Seattle doesn’t have a true go-to receiver
These are the type of uninformed perspectives that litter national coverage of your favorite team. National writers, even so-called experts that dive into greater detail, have such a breadth of teams to cover that they can never truly be watching a team closely (unless it’s in their home town). All of these comments were spot-on accurate when talking about the 2009 Seahawks.
Press coverage was not common. The secondary was one of the worst in the NFL. There was no reliable receiver that demanded double coverage. Even after one week, and four pre-season games, I can tell you all of those things are no longer true.
If Eddie Royal plays (he didn’t practice today, another example of lack of detail), there is no doubt he will see a lot of press coverage. Guess what? Every Broncos receiver will see a lot of press coverage, because that’s the scheme the Seahawks are running this year. It’s why Josh Wilson is no longer on the team.
Seattle’s secondary has more to prove, but Trufant is a top 10, possibly top 5 CB in the NFL this year and Milloy/Thomas are a top half-of-the-league safety tandem. Roy Lewis, Jordan Babineaux, Kelly Jennings and Walter Thurmond represent more depth than we’ve seen a long time.
Mike Williams drops too many passes, but is better than any receiver on the Broncos roster. It’s a stretch to anoint him as the go-to receiver after one game, but that doesn’t mean opposing secondaries can afford to treat him as anything but.
It will be interesting to see how long these outdated perceptions last, regardless of record, as the season moves ahead. Wins draw the most attention and additional analysis. A few more wins, and those national writers can start telling us all what we already know. That’s at least as improvement over what their writing now.