Game Thread: Week 11: Hawks vs 49ers "Must Play Better" Thread

[Battlelyon]

But what if we win and take the Division?

 

[Battlelyon]

I can't believe the fuckin' Cardinals are leading the division....

Just don't think about it, treat it as it is not real.

 

[Judge Fudge]

View attachment 380880

You heard me Bitch....................

 

[flyerhawk]

Knight and Jones looked like a competent backer group and as far as the Oline goes, If Geno would throw to the shorter routes he wouldnt face as much pressure PERIOD! they have at least 2 short routes every pass play but Geno ignores the drop off and anything with in 5 yards of the LoS. He also ignores Lockett WAY to much.

Hard to do quick throws on 5 step drop backs. Quick throws aren't useful when you are in 3rd and 10. Geno completed 78% of his pass attempts. He threw 4 times to the running backs and some other underneath routes.

You are just looking for ways to criticize Geno. The running game is still underperforming. It was a little better yesterday stll way too many runs for 2 or fewer yards. Not being able to get 2 feet on 4th down was embarrassingly bad.

The OL was noticeably better when Lucas was out there. Olu didn't noticably worse than Williams, which is encouraging.

Geno made a stupid error on his pick. No question about that. Trying to hard to make something happen when there wasn't anything there.

 

[JMR]

Shocking to pull off that win after all the errors earlier in the game. I thought for sure we were cooked after not being able to pick up a yard on 2 tries and turning it over on downs, but the D stepped up big time like they did much of the game.

 

[JMR]

Hard to do quick throws on 5 step drop backs. Quick throws aren't useful when you are in 3rd and 10. Geno completed 78% of his pass attempts. He threw 4 times to the running backs and some other underneath routes.

You are just looking for ways to criticize Geno. The running game is still underperforming. It was a little better yesterday stll way too many runs for 2 or fewer yards. Not being able to get 2 feet on 4th down was embarrassingly bad.

The OL was noticeably better when Lucas was out there. Olu didn't noticably worse than Williams, which is encouraging.

Geno made a stupid error on his pick. No question about that. Trying to hard to make something happen when there wasn't anything there.

Geno didn't have a bad game. He made a couple bad throws, but he generally made the plays that were there (with a couple exceptions).

 

[JMR]

A couple things that stuck out to me:

• Bosa going out was the turning point in the game. It's not that we were out of it before that, but we clearly had more success on offense with him on the sideline. In fact, both TDs came after Bosa left the game.
• I am starting to see the potential with AJ Barner as a pass catcher. He isn't going to be Travis Kelce or George Kittle, but he is tough to bring down, has reliable hands, and he isn't a completely plodding runner.
• JSN came up big again. He is working the intermediate routes better and with more frequency -- not just the quick stuff like most of last year and the early going of this one.
• Maybe it's been a quiet(er) year for Spoon, but he was studly yesterday.
• Did a mostly good job bottling up McCaffrey. Jones is playing pretty well at LB and hopefully is here beyond this season. He looks legit.
• Jauan Jennings??? It was maddening how we couldn't stop that guy, but he was really the only guy who was doing significant damage. We kept Deebo in check, and of course we caught a break with Kittle being out.

If the D keeps up this level of play, we'll stay in the playoff hunt.

 

[flyerhawk]

Geno didn't have a bad game. He made a couple bad throws, but he generally made the plays that were there (with a couple exceptions).

He played pretty well on the whole. He had a bad mistake on the pick. Maybe could have avoided a couple of the sacks, maybe not. The problem we have on pass pro is that the interior line gets mauled which crushes the pocket and reduces the escape lanes. How many times did Purdy exploit those lanes?

We need the run blocking to improve still. It was slightly better yesterday but not actually good. You can see a difference in outcomes when we start off a drive with 2nd and 7 or 6 rather than 2nd and 10 or 9. Getting behind schedule early limits what you can do.

 

[HaroldSeattle]

This game was a step forward in the right direction. Still lots of work to do. However even though the OL was so so, it is a good sign that it didn't get steam rolled with starting Olu and up against a good front seven. The OL still needs to make big improvement in the run game, to often the RBs are looking at a solid wall when trying to run. Big break for the OL when Bosa went out, made a noticeable difference on passing downs. The hope is the OL may be functional going forward with Lucas back.
The big change was the defense. Held McCaffery in check and the run defense was so much better.Also got good pressure on Purdy although Purdy when pressured was able to do damage with his scrambles.
Cards lead the division and with a victory next week against them the Seahawks could end up tied for the division lead. The thing is there is hope again. Yesterday was a must win game because a loss would of been the end of any hope and if we are being honest most of us expected the worse going into the game. This hope could be short lived because now next weeks game is a must win. Go Hawks!

 

[Sharkonabicycle]

I hear some saying the OL did okay but I dunno... they still gave up 4 sacks and that's without Hargrave/Givens and Bosa for some of the game (and assuming he wasn't playing 100%). Even Cross got blown up on a play. The 49ers were definitely not at full strength on the DL. I'm not expecting much if anything out of the OL and I didn't see anything that changes my opinion in this game. Maybe Lucas found the fountain of youth and will magically stay healthy for several years and that will help. Olu with ANOTHER high snap? Yeesh (although from what I saw it hit Geno in the hands)

Our defense IMO played okay, but these multiple 3rd down conversions allowing these 8+ minute drives are getting a little maddening. 49ers were 7-11 on 3rd downs and that's without Aiyuk or Kittle... and probably a non-100% Williams. And CMAC will probably never be 100% again, the body can only take so much. Seattle still lost the TOP battle by 7 minutes (and the Os first drive was decent, we took 5 minutes, and then the 9ers responded and exhausted the 1st quarter lol). The interior pass rush still seems to be a bit of a problem. Hall especially gets great EDGE pressure, but there's nobody collapsing the middle so it's super easy for Purdy to step up and just run/take off like he did...

There was some good in this game. Run defense looks far better, JSN second big game in a row and really carried things on the final drive to win. Myers should've gotten a game ball with 2 50+ yarders that he made look easy, and were required to win the game... special teams was good in general. Witherspoon easily had his best game of this year with excellent plays on the ball. ONLY 4 penalties... which is SOMETHING, given Seattle is like the 2nd most penalized team in the last 10 years.

There was also some bad. OL was a little hit or miss. Run game never really got going. Grubb still can't call short yardage plays to save his life and Geno really needs to stop looking for deep passes 24/7... he had some shorter throws that were wide open, but chose to huck it. The underthrown pass to DK 1/1 deep early on could've easily been a pick if DK didn't come back for it. I don't think it was one of Geno's better games but he redeemed himself in the end. Our interior pass pressure seemed to be absent and QB contain didn't work at all... Hall had the easiest sack of his career after Purdy just fell over himself. Hall's speed is incredible coming off the edge but he's almost taking himself out of the play because we are not getting a very good push up the middle.

 

[jerseyhawksfan79]

But what if we win and take the Division?

He sits on McVey's porch begging him not to retire

 

[HaroldSeattle]

Next week is going to be important. Seahawks at home against division leading Cardinals, 49ers on the road against the Packers, Rams at home vs the Eagles. My oh my the possibilities are interesting. I'm getting excited about the season again, after feeling very deflated for a while.

 

[jerseyhawksfan79]

Next week is going to be important. Seahawks at home against division leading Cardinals, 49ers on the road against the Packers, Rams at home vs the Eagles. My oh my the possibilities are interesting. I'm getting excited about the season again, after feeling very deflated for a while.

Can't have that let down game with division on the line. Defense looked good but need that offense to get going sooner rather than later.
Niners/Packers seems like a toss up
Rams/Eagles should be a Philly win unless Siriani fucks up and leaves points on the field which is a high possibility.

 

[flyerhawk]

Next week is going to be important. Seahawks at home against division leading Cardinals, 49ers on the road against the Packers, Rams at home vs the Eagles. My oh my the possibilities are interesting. I'm getting excited about the season again, after feeling very deflated for a while.

I'm glad we won but ultimately this team is, at best, a one and done in the playoffs. But I like that Macdonald is willing to change things on the fly. I like that Grubb is able to make half time adjustments. There is more work to be done but I think there is reason to be optimistic.

Now if JS can just swallow his arrogance and address the interior line, maybe we can get somewhere.

 

[Screamin12th]

Hard to do quick throws on 5 step drop backs. Quick throws aren't useful when you are in 3rd and 10. Geno completed 78% of his pass attempts. He threw 4 times to the running backs and some other underneath routes.

You are just looking for ways to criticize Geno. The running game is still underperforming. It was a little better yesterday stll way too many runs for 2 or fewer yards. Not being able to get 2 feet on 4th down was embarrassingly bad.

The OL was noticeably better when Lucas was out there. Olu didn't noticably worse than Williams, which is encouraging.

Geno made a stupid error on his pick. No question about that. Trying to hard to make something happen when there wasn't anything there.

Geno Smiths average time to throw is over 2.4 seconds. Thats plenty of time to throw every route, correct minus a hailmary? Yet he doesnt throw the short drop offs or crossers very often even when the pressure says to do just that. Do NOT say he does because we all have seen that he avoids these routes ALL THE DAMN TIME even though they are there for the taking. His average target depth is 8.6 yards from the LoS. Which is fine but he is passing up 5 yard gains for an attempt for 10+ yards ALL THE TIME! You got to take those shorter plays to keep yourself out of 3rd and long which we face more than any other team in the league. You CAN NOT SAY its the running game putting us in 3rd and long when we run the ball less than almost EVERY OTHER TEAM in the NFL. Another stat we all need to pay attention to
Redzone passes + TD conv % ( 13% ) OMFG! one of the Worst in the league. Also he has one of the highest INT rates inside the 20 yard line in the NFL.

Geno Smith needs to get the ball out of his hands faster on quicker routes that they DO RUN. instead he sits there in the pocket waiting and STARING DOWN 1 WR and gets sacked or INTERCEPTED way to often. Ask ANYONE on this board and they will all agree.

Walter Jones stated, Geno is trying to do to much and needs to take what the defense is giving him instead of forcing it all the time. He also stated He needs to have better field vision. I believe what walter Jones says before i would believe a Geno ball hugger. "walter Jones" Geno has not helped his Oline out at all"

TD% 4% INT% 4%

 

[Sharkonabicycle]

Geno Smiths average time to throw is over 2.4 seconds. Thats plenty of time to throw every route, correct? Yet he doesnt throw the short drop offs or crossers very often even when the pressure says to do just that. Do NOT say he does because we all have seen that he avoids these routes ALL THE DAMN TIME even though they are there for the taking. His average target depth is 8.6 yards from the LoS. Which is fine but he is passing up 5 yard gains for an attempt for 10+ yards ALL THE TIME! You got to take those shorter plays to keep yourself out of 3rd and long which we face more than any other team in the league. You CAN NOT SAY its the running game putting us in 3rd and long when we run the ball less than almost EVERY OTHER TEAM in the NFL. Another stat we all need to pay attention to
Redzone passes + TD conv % ( 13% ) OMFG! one of the Worst in the league. Also he has one of the highest INT rates inside the 20 yard line in the NFL.

Geno Smith needs to get the ball out of his hands faster on quicker routes that they DO RUN. instead he sits there in the pocket waiting and STARING DOWN 1 WR and gets sacked or INTERCEPTED way to often. Ask ANYONE on this board and they will all agree.

Walter Jones stated, Geno is trying to do to much and needs to take what the defense is giving him instead of forcing it all the time. He also stated He needs to have better field vision. I believe what walter Jones says before i would believe a Geno ball hugger. "walter Jones" Geno has not helped his Oline out at all"

I've had a big problem with this in Geno's gameplay or Grubb's system... Geno seems to be searching for the major downfield pass way too often. There were multiple instances where guys were wide open within 1-5 yards in the San Fran game, yet he wanted to chuck it downfield 10+ yards and just held onto the ball too long till everything collapsed.

DK is your only real major downfield threat (given Fant is out) so I'm not sure why he keeps looking deep and for sideline/out routes 24/7... I have to imagine that's Grubb. K9 has proven to be dangerous in the backfield, Charbs was the best receiving RB in that draft... so why are these deep throws such a thing? I get they work at times and Seattle has enough skill positions to make it work, but it just seems we stall on offense because of it.

It was nice to see Seattle start out the San Fran game with under center snaps and playaction, but that was quickly abandoned...

 

[flyerhawk]

Geno Smiths average time to throw is over 2.4 seconds. Thats plenty of time to throw every route, correct minus a hailmary? Yet he doesnt throw the short drop offs or crossers very often even when the pressure says to do just that. Do NOT say he does because we all have seen that he avoids these routes ALL THE DAMN TIME even though they are there for the taking. His average target depth is 8.6 yards from the LoS. Which is fine but he is passing up 5 yard gains for an attempt for 10+ yards ALL THE TIME! You got to take those shorter plays to keep yourself out of 3rd and long which we face more than any other team in the league. You CAN NOT SAY its the running game putting us in 3rd and long when we run the ball less than almost EVERY OTHER TEAM in the NFL. Another stat we all need to pay attention to
Redzone passes + TD conv % ( 13% ) OMFG! one of the Worst in the league. Also he has one of the highest INT rates inside the 20 yard line in the NFL.

Geno Smith needs to get the ball out of his hands faster on quicker routes that they DO RUN. instead he sits there in the pocket waiting and STARING DOWN 1 WR and gets sacked or INTERCEPTED way to often. Ask ANYONE on this board and they will all agree.

Walter Jones stated, Geno is trying to do to much and needs to take what the defense is giving him instead of forcing it all the time. He also stated He needs to have better field vision. I believe what walter Jones says before i would believe a Geno ball hugger. "walter Jones" Geno has not helped his Oline out at all"

TD% 4% INT% 4%

There are lots of ways that Geno Smith can improve his game. He is far from perfect. Which is why no one thinks he is a anything more than a middle of the pack QB. Cherry picking stats is always fun.

But, once again, you focus on his flaws and ignore when he does things right. You were all over him here when he threw that dumb pick. But you were incapable of conceding that he played very well in crunch time to carry us to a win after the OL was unable to get enough push for the Seahawks to get a 1 foot on TWO tries.

BTW, your boy Drew Lock got beat out by Tommy Cutlets and is the 2nd string QB for the Giants now that they have shelved Jones. Remember how you said he was better than Geno and needed to start last year?

 

[flyerhawk]

I've had a big problem with this in Geno's gameplay or Grubb's system... Geno seems to be searching for the major downfield pass way too often. There were multiple instances where guys were wide open within 1-5 yards in the San Fran game, yet he wanted to chuck it downfield 10+ yards and just held onto the ball too long till everything collapsed.

DK is your only real major downfield threat (given Fant is out) so I'm not sure why he keeps looking deep and for sideline/out routes 24/7... I have to imagine that's Grubb. K9 has proven to be dangerous in the backfield, Charbs was the best receiving RB in that draft... so why are these deep throws such a thing? I get they work at times and Seattle has enough skill positions to make it work, but it just seems we stall on offense because of it.

It was nice to see Seattle start out the San Fran game with under center snaps and playaction, but that was quickly abandoned...

And yet on the 4 passes that Geno threw to the running backs we gained.... 7 yards. I guess he's so bad that he only throws to them when they are covered?

I have no idea what you are talking about regarding giving up playing under center. On our first touchdown, Geno was under 6 times on that 11 play drive. On the next drive that resulted in us losing the ball on a loss of downs, Geno was under center on 7 of 10 plays.

 

[Sharkonabicycle]

And yet on the 4 passes that Geno threw to the running backs we gained.... 7 yards. I guess he's so bad that he only throws to them when they are covered?

I have no idea what you are talking about regarding giving up playing under center. On our first touchdown, Geno was under 6 times on that 11 play drive. On the next drive that resulted in us losing the ball on a loss of downs, Geno was under center on 7 of 10 plays.

Yah they started to get back to it. I kind of meant it got abandoned really early, but then they started getting back to it. I get my comment was not clear, apologies. Either way I hope they stick with that more. They had the nice snaps under center working with playaction and everything. It was nice to see instead of shotgun 24/7 which has been the season theme. I think it was prob. to help Olu. Seattle prior to this game had the 4th highest shotgun rate in the league... when Williams was playing a full season for Miami, they were around the league average.

Grubb is a heavy shotgun coach, he was in UW as well. I'm not saying you have to snap under center, but it's nice to see. I mean take Creed Humphrey, that guy can't snap a ball to save his life, but his blocking is elite... Course he doesn't have a couple scrubs playing at guard, either... and an elite QB/Offensive coach.

As for your comment on throwing to runningbacks... yah it didn't work this game... K9 ranks 14th amongst all runningbacks for yards, and Charbs is 19. So combine them and it's not too horrible. What's a little more concerning though is K9/Charbs are ranked 21 and 22 respectively for yards per reception (and that's with RBs with over 20 receptions). So there's a good chunk of teams involving their RBs that are getting way more per reception than we are. And I know we can dig into stats all day, I didn't do a major in depth analysis on this (like looking at longs/outliers) but it does seem we're not getting much out of our RBs in receiving in terms of efficiency.

Now that all said, the stats I mentioned above are consistent with your comment. 7 yards on 4 plays... my question, is that on Geno (taking too long trying to huck it downfield and the checkdown gets spotted), is that play design from Grubb? I don't know... Other teams I've watched for a while seem to have no problem passing to a RB on a designed play and gashing us for 3rd and 15 conversions. lol, why can't we do that? The talent is there... at least at the RB spot.

 

[flyerhawk]

Yah they started to get back to it. I kind of meant it got abandoned really early, but then they started getting back to it. I get my comment was not clear, apologies. Either way I hope they stick with that more. They had the nice snaps under center working with playaction and everything. It was nice to see instead of shotgun 24/7 which has been the season theme. I think it was prob. to help Olu. Seattle prior to this game had the 4th highest shotgun rate in the league... when Williams was playing a full season for Miami, they were around the league average.

Grubb is a heavy shotgun coach, he was in UW as well. I'm not saying you have to snap under center, but it's nice to see. I mean take Creed Humphrey, that guy can't snap a ball to save his life, but his blocking is elite... Course he doesn't have a couple scrubs playing at guard, either... and an elite QB/Offensive coach.

As for your comment on throwing to runningbacks... yah it didn't work this game... K9 ranks 14th amongst all runningbacks for yards, and Charbs is 19. So combine them and it's not too horrible. What's a little more concerning though is K9/Charbs are ranked 21 and 22 respectively for yards per reception (and that's with RBs with over 20 receptions). So there's a good chunk of teams involving their RBs that are getting way more per reception than we are. And I know we can dig into stats all day, I didn't do a major in depth analysis on this (like looking at longs/outliers) but it does seem we're not getting much out of our RBs in receiving in terms of efficiency. Is that on Geno? I dunno, could very well be on Grubb and his playcalling.

Trust me, I would LOVE to see this build out an effective screen game. It can be a killer when dealing with a lot of zone defense. But I think we are being a little too harsh on the system and Geno if we are complaining that Geno isn't checking down enough when he completed 78% of his passes.

The Niners have very good backers that can track down those outlet passes.

Ultimately, we just need more consistency from our OL. I was listening to Schlereth a week or two ago and he was saying that playing OL requires the most skill of any position. They are the worst athletes on the field and they are expected to NEVER get physically beat. They can only do that by being really good at their craft. Right now our OL just getting beat too much, either by the other player or by committing penalties.

The OL was MUCH better at not committing fouls last Sunday. But they were still beat way too many times. ESPECIALLY on running plays. That is STILL our biggest issue as a team. They have to fix these early down negative runs. They are crushing.