Brian Nemhauser·
Morning After
··3 min read

The Morning After: Seahawks 2019 Preseason Ends on High Note for Some

There is not a lot to be learned from third and fourth string players opposing one another on an NFL field. A significant number of the young men who played Thursday night between the Raiders and the Seahawks will never play a snap in a regular season NFL game. Seattle rested at least 31 of the 90 players on their roster, and is set to cut 37 players this Saturday. A few players made their case to avoid the reaper.

Ben Burr-Kirven

The speedy Husky linebacker had yet to make much of an impression through training camp or three preseason games, but he was everywhere against the Raiders. He finished with 12 tackles, a sack, a pass defensed and would have had more had they not called a ridiculous penalty on him for tackling the quarterback.

It will be hard for the Seahawks to let Burr-Kirven go at this point given his youth and progress. He may also be aided by an injury at the position.

Shaquem Griffin

Griffin played only briefly, but once again showed how valuable he is as a special teams player. He had a great tackle on punt coverage and was flying all over the field on other coverage plays. The bummer for Griffin is that he was forced to come out due to ongoing issues with his knee.

Pete Carroll said Griffin will undergo an MRI this week to determine if anything more serious is going on. Either way, there is an increased chance Griffin could be cut should the team not see a clear path to health in the near-term, especially given the step forward from Burr-Kirven.

However, I believe the Seahawks will cut Barkevious Mingo. Losing both Mingo and Griffin would greatly impact the special teams unit. Only Neiko Thorpe comes close to their contributions.

Geno Smith

Smith all but wrapped up the backup quarterback job last weekend against the Chargers, and clinched it with a flashy first half against the Raiders. He threw his best two deep passes of the preseason and looked in command while Paxton Lynch was pretty awful.

Smith did come out of the game with an injury to the knee he recently had a cyst removed from, so that is something to watch.

C.J. Prosise

What a difference a week makes. The man most Seahawks fans love to hate because of his durability issues, once again showed why the coaches have been so patient with him.

Prosise is arguably the most talented running back on the roster. Set aside his durability and just look at his ability to run inside, outside, avoid tackles, break tackles, break big runs, run routes as a receiver, and pass block. Chris Carson is obviously a worthy debate, but he is the only one.

It seems all but assured that Prosise will once again make the roster, and if he can somehow stay on the field, it very well could be the most shocking and impactful addition to the Seahawks offense.

Other notes

  • Gary Jennings did nothing to make a stronger case for himself in this game, and it anyone’s guess whether the team will spend a roster spot on a player who clearly is not ready to contribute. It will come down to him or Malik Turner.
  • The nickel corner job remains a question mark. None of the players have done enough to feel confident in their stake. I’d personally go with Ugo Amadi at this point and bet on him growing as the season wears on.
  • Thank goodness we finally saw Michael Dickson kick the way we know he can. He had been having a quietly poor preseason before booming a few Thursday night.

Be sure to tune in Saturday evening at 5PM PT to watch Real Hawk Talk as we break down the Seahawks cuts and make our season predictions!

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Brian Nemhauser
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5 Comments

  2. * Jazz is the toughest call. Is it possible to shoehorn him to PC @ 6’5″?

    And what about Jawuan Johnson’s play @ DB? Hope he makes it to PC, despite logjam @ LB position.

  3. So here, in the Central time zone, we didn’t get the game in real time and I’m too old and not that motivated for a relatively meaningless fourth preseason game that airs after midnight to have seen the action. But three seemingly meaningful outcomes are most reported: BBK shown bright, Geno secured his backup roll if not too seriously injured, and Prosise didn’t break as usual (yet).

    I remind myself that the Raiders only brought 45 players, nearly all backups and nearly all will be cut in various forms by tomorrow, so the level of opponent was not all that stout last night. But, in relative terms, we’re mostly filling in the bottom of our roster as well. And it’s going to be interesting to see how JS and company hide assets they want to keep for future needs. BBK has skills and demonstrated toughness in taking advantage of his opportunity. That coupled with his earlier noted pro football IQ makes him worth keeping. Many are down on Mingo, and some down on Quem, and in the first blush of roster adjustment they both might be shelved; Quem to IR and Mingo dropped at first but told to standby with fingers crossed that someone else doesn’t grab him. Why? Because for all that too many fans think we’re stacked at LB, as I’ve noted before, I’m still concerned about KJ’s knee, and not complacent on Kendricks availability past 9/25. All the more reason to believe BBK is a priority keep, and Mingo a likely one as well.

    Smith got a veiled endorsement from Russ when RW was commenting on his play calling stint, so based on that looking like an insider commentary Smith has the job barring his knee cancelling that.

    Ah Prosise………….he’s like an addictive drug. You know it’s bad for you, but you keep coming back for more because of the short term high. I’m still in the camp of trade him for value if you can find some “addict” out there who will over look his fragility. Pete will probably not allow that, but it’s what is likely best for the team. McKissic has similar skills, sure, not nearly as good as a functioning Prosise (which is admittedly tantalizing though fleeting), but useful. And considering the uncertainty in the WR ranks, McK has some added value.

    Let’s expand on the WR thing. First, I think that receivers in this scheme/team need to have a lot of trust from Russ to see the ball come their way. Russ doesn’t like to throw to low percentage (from his point of view) opportunities. We’ve seen it many times, when receivers show lack of reliability he ignores them and throws to his high confidence guys. Baldwin, Kearse, and Lockett are/were his security guys. The others were roll players. This season it’s up to Lockett and Brown to be those guys, and maybe DK if he can stay on the field and yield…..results. I wouldn’t be surprised if Ursua is a Russ kinda guy as well. I don’t think Ferguson has any of that synergy, despite his physical gifts. Russ also seems to have faith in McK, though we have to go back a couple seasons to see it. McK might be a closet WR for this year, we’ll see.

    Don’t be surprised if the JS nearly annual surprise trade is with the Browns. There’s a lot of talent stacked over there because they’ve got a savvy GM who hasn’t wasted the opportunities that were accumulated. Most of the talk will probably still focus on the Clowney stuff, but I’m still skeptical that he can be had reasonably. His salary expectations are likely more of a stumbling block than team trade desires. We’ve got plenty of tools to acquire him, and if both Ed Dickson and Mingo do in fact get cleared from the roster that’s another near $8m reported to be added to the cap space. JS has a long term draft board (admittedly fairly speculative at this point in time) that gives them a rough idea of how they’re going to spend the draft capital they have built up for next spring, so that too will inform decision making now. Or said another way, a one year rental for Clowney might make sense………………..IF the price is right. It’s gonna be a fun couple of days ahead.

    1. Well, there ya go………………….. Pending physicals, Clowney is comin’ to town. Bye bye Mingo, but getting value for a bubble guy is a good thing. Bye bye Martin, not so happy with a decent potential youngster, but ya gotta give to get. Trading 3rds a year apart is fair from out point of view. Now, I hope like hell my uneasiness about Clowney is wrong. Probably a 1 year rental, but if he’s ballin’ for a big free agent deal next year then there’s lots of motivation at hand. Stay healthy big guy…………

  4. I am so torn on CJ. The dude has oodles of talent no doubt. But you keep trying to separate that and his durability and I just dont see it that way. For me durability is a part of the player as much as talent. This is very similar the P. Richardson situation, where the best we can hope for is that he stays healthy and maybe some other team overpays and we get a comp pick out of it.

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