Last Night....

[seahawksfan234]

I was born and raised until I was 10 in Las Vegas....My old man cheered for the Lions and I wasn't going there, so when I was 9 I watched the Eagles make their first run to a Super Bowl (lost to the Raiders) and have been loyal ever since I was a kid....

Love the M's when I first moved here and stayed loyal, and up too 2000 was a huge Sonics fan, until the league went to shit....

Ahh I see. For me the only time I've spent away from Seattle was when I was in Europe and when I went to law school, so I've been unable to root for any non-Seattle teams.

Haven't watched an NBA game since the Sonics left. Not necessarily a "boycott" so to speak, I just don't have any interest in a league that does not have a representative from the city I identify with. I believe I still have a Sonics Kevin Durant jersey in my closet, lol.

 

[mcnabb7542]

Makes it a bit better. Our program is looking up and we have a bright future ahead of us.

Yeah, last season's taste of the play offs has really raised the bar, again there was huge questions coming into this season about the Dawgs and I'm sure the playoff glasses were still on, making these loses sting just a little harder.


It's a work In progress, but we had that time when Sark was here, it just feels like it's time for this program to turn a corner for good

 

[seahawksfan234]

Pretty much everything is positive outside of their continued inability to play on the road.

They've had like 3 decent road wins since Petersen came here and two of those were just the cougs. They beat a ranked USC team in '15 and that's about it.

It's time he takes that next step away from Boise and starts looking for higher end staff that has experience with coaching elite teams that can handle road games. He needs help.

It's pretty strange. I was worried about this game from the beginning. I almost actually bet on Stanford to cover the spread because I figured if we won, it would be by less than 6.

I was at that USC win. I still recall someone saying to me, "You came a long way to lose" lol. Good thing Sark was drunk.

 

[WizardHawk]

They need to continue to up their recruiting and find a way to get their kids more ready for road games. Both are doable, but when?

 

[WizardHawk]

It's pretty strange. I was worried about this game from the beginning. I almost actually bet on Stanford to cover the spread because I figured if we won, it would be by less than 6.

I was at that USC win. I still recall someone saying to me, "You came a long way to lose" lol. Good thing Sark was drunk.

His staff is all guys he had at Boise. He needs to pull from the larger pool now. Lake is money and they have other quality staff, but as a group they are not putting their kids in position to win road games. And it appears they do not have the ability to address it as they stand.

This is the difference between being elite and just being good/great.

 

[seahawksfan234]

Yeah, last season's taste of the play offs has really raised the bar, again there was huge questions coming into this season about the Dawgs and I'm sure the playoff glasses were still on, making these loses sting just a little harder.


It's a work In progress, but we had that time when Sark was here, it just feels like it's time for this program to turn a corner for good

I do put a lot of blame on our lack of receiving talent, and I must admit I didn't follow the game as closely as I normally do, but I'm starting to wonder about Browning. I don't think he's a bad QB, but he doesn't have the arm strength of a top tier QB. I'm also wondering about his dedication.

Not long after he turned 21, I ran into him at a bar around UW and he was absolutely wasted. I can't blame him, I was wasted 90% of the time I was at UW, but I wasn't the starting QB. Friend of mine claimed Browning went out drinking the night before the UCLA game. He just doesn't look as impressive as he did last year. He's somewhere between last year and his freshman year. There's really a lot of hesitation there.

 

[seahawksfan234]

His staff is all guys he had at Boise. He needs to pull from the larger pool now. Lake is money and they have other quality staff, but as a group they are not putting their kids in position to win road games. And it appears they do not have the ability to address it as they stand.

This is the difference between being elite and just being good/great.

I agree.

God I really wish that Tedford was still here.

 

[WizardHawk]

That's coaching though.

Coaches teach and put their players in the best position to make plays. That's what they do.

If you have a QB that consistently doesn't make plays on the road you aren't coaching him up and aren't putting him in the best position to make whatever plays he's capable of and mitigate his weaknesses.

I'm actually more interested in seeing Smith go because of that aspect than the play calling.

 

[seahawksfan234]

That's coaching though.

Coaches teach and put their players in the best position to make plays. That's what they do.

If you have a QB that consistently doesn't make plays on the road you aren't coaching him up and aren't putting him in the best position to make whatever plays he's capable of and mitigate his weaknesses.

I'm actually more interested in seeing Smith go because of that aspect than the play calling.

I'm gonna have to re-watch the game. When I was at that party I was the only one even paying attention lol, and even then I didn't catch all of it.

I'll have to see if it's on demand or something.

 

[WizardHawk]

Shaw took the entire blame for the loss last week because he said they failed to put their kids in the best position to win. He was 100% right. The same can be said for this staff this week.

Coach K doesn't get a pass, but this really was the only bad game they have had this year. It needs to be looked at, but we have far more confidence in that side getting 'fixed'.

Petersen has so much upside and does so many things right that he's open to sharp criticism on this, but that's about it.

Smith has had these bad games far more often than good ones and isn't making headway with Browning. It's time to move on from him.

 

[mcnabb7542]

Welling if Browning is really out partying it up and letting his head swell maybe someone should put his ass on the bench to show him he's not bigger them the program. Anytime a player does this a coaching staff must prioritize this message, "No one is bigger then the program!"


This is also my thoughts on Victor, guys not following a guideline and the coaches keeping it quite to not shame the program

 

[WizardHawk]

Not having Victor in at LB last night was plain old bad as well. BBK may have looked good against a lot of the lessor teams they have faced, but Victor is a beast against those damaging running backs and you really wonder how much less yardage Love gets with AV running across the middle. BBK missed several tackles and made some poor angles.

 

[TheDayMan]

Well, the entire Seahawks roster is banged up. The Huskies right now may not even make it to the Pac-12 Championship, the Mariners are going nowhere, I'm hungover as fuck, when is it an appropriate time for a mimosa?

 

[seahawksfan234]

I said mimosa, not white Russian.

Although... that can happen...

 

[TheDayMan]

It's not all coaching.

I'm not coming down on the defense at all, they still aren't the problem, they gave up some big plays, and more points than they have in two years, but they still did enough to win. They were tough in the redzone and held Stanford to a bunch of field goals, and you can harp on the long passes in the first half, but the real issue was the Stanford running game letting loose in the 2nd half. That's gonna happen when your defense doesn't get a break and is tasked with stopping a very good run offense.

On offense, yes, we all see the glaring issues, I had hoped Smith had grown, this game (and asu) was just like a bad flashback to 2015. He clearly needs to be better or be gone, but at the end of the game, when Browning had a chance to cement himself in future husky lore, he takes 20+ yard sacks, and runs on 4th and 21 with a minute left. You can try to put that on coaching, but this isn't a high school team, I guarantee those situations have been practiced, and that's not how Browning has been coached to handle them.

 

[seahawksfan234]

It's not all coaching.

I'm not coming down on the defense at all, they still aren't the problem, they gave up some big plays, and more points than they have in two years, but they still did enough to win. They were tough in the redzone and held Stanford to a bunch of field goals, and you can harp on the long passes in the first half, but the real issue was the Stanford running game letting loose in the end half. That's gonna happen when your defense doesn't get a break and is tasked with stopping a very good run offense.

On offense, yes, we all see the glaring issues, I had hoped Smith had grown, this game (and asu) was just like a bad flashback to 2015. He clearly needs to be better or be gone, but at the end of the game, when Browning had a chance to cement himself in future husky lore, he takes 20+ yard sacks, and runs on 4th and 21 with a minute left. You can try to put that on coaching, but this isn't a high school team, I guarantee those situations have been practiced, and that's not how Browning has been coached to handle them.

I think he has been watching too much of Russell Wilson.

 

[TheDayMan]

I think he has been watching too much of Russell Wilson.

Yeah, he clearly wants to make something happen, but as much as we bragged on how smart and prepared he is last year, he's sure had his head up his ass at times this year. Part of it is coaching, part is not having a freak of nature who's general direction you just need to throw it towards to be bailed out, but not all of it. Some of it has to be put on him just having his head up his ass.

 

[WizardHawk]

But that goes back to coaching. If he wasn't coached to do those things and he keeps doing it game after game who's fault is that?

Coaches:
Train
Game plan
Put your kids in the best position to make plays

Players:
Follow your training
Stay in your assignments
Execute

They had failure on both sides of that last night and on both offense and defense.

No one denies there are deficiencies on the offense with all the injuries and just lack of secondary targets stepping up. That reduces your options for putting kids in the best position and limits the game plan. But you can't watch that game and come away feeling like the staff did everything they could and it was just the kids not doing what they were supposed to. I could go break down quite a few of those defensive alignments in that second half. They got away from what was working and as those kids tired out they had more and more issues completing tackles and staying in their assignments.

 

[TheDayMan]

Look at the bright side dudes. I'm much happier feeling pissed off and bummed out after losing to Stanford and losing all reasonable hope for a conference championship in week 11, and only being able to hope for 10-2 and an Alamo or Holiday Bowl, than I was being happy going 7-5/6-6 and being thankful for any bowl.

I think we were all hoping ASU was somewhat of an aberration. Well, it wasn't. Still got some shit to work through, but even with that shit we're gonna have reasonable expectations for a Pac 12 championship going into next year too.

What I'm trying to say is, calm the fuck down a bit. If after the 2015 season you were offered what we've had in '16-now, you'd be all over it. I'm really thankful we had a reason to have these expectations that are currently pissing us off all in 1.5 years.

 

[WizardHawk]

What I'm trying to say is, calm the fuck down a bit.

No one is off the deep end man. Relax.

I can't imagine anyone is lamenting the Sark era or anything that stupid.

It's entirely reasonable to discuss the reasons we won't reach the goals so many thought were in reach before the season started. It's not reasonable to be ready to dive off a cliff over it.

This is still a very good team and every day we wake up we should thank the football gods for the gift of Petersen. It's just not an elite team right now and that's clear as day.

For sure I'd still take this team right now as is over anything we've had at least since the '01 RB winning team and probably more back to the end of the James era.

James didn't dominate the national stage in his first few seasons either. He did get to a RB about as fast as Petersen got to the playoffs, but James too had ups and downs through the 80's. Took them a while to dial it in.

The frustrating part right now is we know what the problem is and yet there doesn't seem to be a solution coming soon. They don't play well on the road and it needs to be addressed.