We were a little off on the roster move earlier involving Mike Gibson and Kyle Williams.
Officially, Gibson has been signed to the active roster, while Williams has been signed to the practice squad. To make room for Williams on the practice squad, they’ve released guard Mark Lewis.
The addition of Gibson and the fact that Rob Sims has yet to practice this week makes me wonder if Sims will be ready for the Cowboys game next Sunday.
That or Walt is headed to the IR. (or retirement)
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What is with these 6’3″ and 312 or under linemen that TR picks up. I want to see us get a monster or two out of the draft this year!!!! Something we can all be excited about.
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Dukeshire: “That or Walt is headed to the IR. (or retirement) ”
A very real possibility, I expect, but I hope he’s not headed for retirement. I really like watching him play.
You know, I have a suspicion if these guys were all healthy you would see a very dominating front in Seattle. an excellent run game and, consequently, a very potent and well balanced offense.
Heh…. might as well daydream about what it’s like to live in a Bugs Bunny cartoon.
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If in fact Walt goes on IR or retirement it will be yet more testimony to the mismanagement by the front office. I understand that no one can predict the future. But giving us that “non weight bearing bone” crap and the fact that he is 35yo should have been enough for the F/O to have the foresight to at least have good contingency plan. Something better than relying on Locklear to stay healthy as the only safety net.
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Silly wabbit..
Of course they had to sign Gibson to the active roster, since uh, that is kinda the rule about picking up a practice squad guy.. But Divish is a baseball man, so we’ll let that slide..
I’m not giving up on Walt. My heart won’t let me.
And the reason we aren’t signing big road-grading O-lineman is that our new system really doesn’t allow for them. We need good, athletic bodies on the line who can get out in space when needed. Unger is the prototype on the interior, and I think Locklear is close to the prototype on the ends.. We just need to get healthy up front. Hopefully they saw something in Gibson that makes this move worthwhile and helps us out inside. I need to look into his history to see if he comes from a zone-blocking background or not..
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Snydro,
who said anything about “big road grading O-linemen”? I want someone bigger than 6’3″ and that seems to be the magic number with TR, most of the time, when it comes to centers and guards. Bigger doesn’t mean less athletic.
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The funny thing is that we were told (by Knapp and Ruskell) that you don’t need overly good OL in the ZBS. You probably don’t need a good QB either if you decide that you’ll never run the ball. Too bad we can’t call plays where we don’t need our OL to block anyone. LOL.
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BobbyK: “The funny thing is that we were told (by Knapp and Ruskell) that you don’t need overly good OL in the ZBS.”
Well, maybe they’re right. Maybe less is more in a zone blocking scheme. Even so, don’t you think they both might agree that you need a little more than rookies, cast offs and the odd limping starter?
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You’d think!
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The perfect play with our blocking…
Set up for the screen (the OL are told to allow pressure — don’t tell ours, they will give up the pressure anyways)…
Throw a lateral to Seneca, who lines up at RB… he fires a bomb to Burleson or Butler (or throws another lateral to Matt, who is running backwards himself, and he throws the bomb.
That’s about the only play I can think of where can allow pressure and be okay.
Or the gimmick plays… one side of the OL doesn’t move and you run to the opposite side. They don’t block anyone anyways, so by staying still, they can at least trick some of the defenders not to try to fire off the ball.
Any other ideas for teams who have no blocking? In a previous post, I had said to simply snap the ball to Forsett or Burleson about 15 yards and just have them catch it and pretend it’s a kick-off and just start running to wherever they see an opening.
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“Any other ideas for teams who have no blocking?”
Mark the calendar for late April.
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1st, it’s harder to find bigger, athletic linemen than smaller, athletic linemen. If you wanted to go sub-300lbs like Denver used to do, you’d have even more choices. If there are any 6’5″, 330lb highly athletic linemen out there as free agents, they most likely are druggies or criminals, or have proven they can’t mentally absorb an NFL caliber game. At best they’d be long-shot prospects.
At this point, Seattle can’t afford to bring in projects for the OL, even on the practice squad, since the PS player could be needed on the active roster at any time.
2nd, a bit shorter types can actually be a positive on the inside, where a lower center of gravity can help (especially at center.) Tackles tend to be the taller types, where they can use their longer arms and frame for leverage in space.
Going back to my Denver comment as context, I think the Seattle brass meant that the ZB system didn’t need the OL attributes that are highly rated in more traditional blocking schemes. It’s how Denver was able to get a good line in the past, they’d pick up the small, brainy athletic types for their system, guys that couldn’t fit in elsewhere.
To me it’s like the Holmgren offense and wide receivers – it’s great to have WR’s who are big, tall, and blazing fast, but for Holmgren it was most important to have guys who had great hands and ran perfect routes, and were on the same page as the QB in reading defenses and making sight adjustments. So Holmgren offenses put up big passing numbers with what in all honesty was a rather mediocre crop of receivers during Holmgren’s tenure.
It’s one reason why Darrell Jackson was a big success and Travis Taylor was a flop.
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It’s interesting to me that a zone blocking scheme is thought to have linemen that aren’t as talented as in a traditional scheme. Why is that? Where did that notion come from? The skills required are different (quickness vs. brute strength, etc…), but I don’t think that is a mask or cover or something embodied in linemen with “less” talent. It’s different, and I’m not sure a team is going find a supremely talented lineman, regardless of what scheme those best fit, on the “street” this time of year. Got to make due with the leftovers, as it were.
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If in fact Walt goes on IR or retirement it will be yet more testimony to the mismanagement by the front office. I understand that no one can predict the future. But giving us that “non weight bearing bone” crap and the fact that he is 35yo should have been enough for the F/O to have the foresight to at least have good contingency plan. Something better than relying on Locklear to stay healthy as the only safety net
Those plans were in place…..but correct me if I’m wrong…I doubt most teams plan on starting a 4th string LT…maybe they do…
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How were they in place 5704?
Walt started slowing down before last season. I understand taking Curry, because he was the best player in the draft. But Ruskell as always seen Locklear as Jones’ replacement. In many people’s minds, that thinking was faulty, and we’re starting to see why.
The bottom line is, Ruskell is a defensive guy who has proven time and time again to make wrong choices with the offensive line. That, and he has a reputation of a guy that only hires his friends rather than put in the due diligence and find the right candidates.
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Well, the Hummingbird-Mallards are back to their losing ways. Atleast the Cardinals QB did not pass for the one mile I thought he would pass for but he showed out anyway. The Cardinals have been playing the Hummingbirds well for the past 5 or 6 seasons. So the lost is nothing new.
The Hummingbirds QB is mad because people are tired of the losing? His being injured all the time and throwing interceptions all the time and in big games is the reason people are tired of the losing. He played in the game and the offense only gets 3 points? What’s the excuse this time, the kicker? What is 5 yds from James? The # 30 running back from pre-season could gain 5 yards. And where is that toasted DB/S Lawyer? Has he played yet? Doesn’t matter, the DBs got toasted all day long by the Cardinals wide outs. College teams could beat the Hummingbirds. And from FLA and Texas, some High School teams could beat the Hummingbird-Mallards. No, blame Alexander for falling down after being finger touched by a defensive player. Blame Holmgren for the bottom basement talent. Way to save money and lose games with sixth string talent. What is 3 points going to do? Make the Mallards QB say that the fans are wrong for bashing the team? Even the Raiders had more than 3 points and they won a game. Poor Hummingbird-Mallards and their excuses.
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It doesn’t matter how many contingency plans you put in, if all the guys in the contingency plan get hurt.
The only way Ruskell’s reasoning on this is bad, is if Sean Locklear had stayed healthy and was a disaster at LT. Then you can say Ruskell misevaluated the situation.
If Ruskell had traded for Ryan Clady or picked Jason Smith and Michael Oher in the 1st round, and all those guys were out by game 2, is that “Ruskell not planning for Jones being unable to play?”
He didn’t get Clady and/or draft 2 1st round tackles but bottom line, the replacements got hurt too and that’s why Seattle is where it is.
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Duke – I’ve thought that too with respect to the OL having to have “talent.” It’s a different kind of talent, but duct tape on a bad player and putting him into a ZBS won’t make him good/better.
I love ignorant “fans” from franchises that hardly count/matter (not like we’re pillars of the NFL either, at least ’til we win the Bowl — hopefully, in my lifetime). They give me a good laugh. Personally, I don’t think they are worth replying to.
I love Walt and I hope he can come back. But he’s not going to retire. He can’t. None of us would in this scenario either; unless the Seahawks/Walt work out some agreement. Technically, if Walt retired tomorrow, the Seahawks could go after him for a portion of his signing bonus that he was given because he isn’t honoring the remainder of the contract. Kind of like the Lions did with Barry Sanders. I know the ending of their careers aren’t similar… but technically I wouldn’t retire either if I were Walt (if he is truly done). And I doubt any of you would either. I would hope the organization wouldn’t turn it into a PR nightmare (like Hutchinson, Steve) and I doubt it would, but stranger things have happened.
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And another thing, if Walt retired tomorrow… he’d lose the rest of his $7million salary for the remainder of the season (as it’s guaranteed right now, since he made the opening day roster). He’s not going to want to give up about $5 million in remaining salary and knowing he may have to give back a portion of his signing bonus too. You can talk about ethics all you want, but 99.99% of us would stick it out through the rest of the year on IR or being inactive if we weren’t placed on IR even if we knew our career is over.
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We have to draft a Left Tackle next year. We just have to. Im not going to give up on this team. I will never ever do that.
If we get a Left Tackle, hopefully it is possible to get one of the top safetys as well. Babineaux just is not cutting it.
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Interesting that TR is finding these athletic linemen for our ZBS on teams like Miami and Philly who favor the big road-grader type guys for their man-blocking schemes. Brandon Frye was lost in Miami’s system, but began to do really well in ours. I hope Gibson can follow suit.
That said, if Rob Sims and Damien McInosh are not in shape to start against the Cowboys, then we are toast. McIntosh and Sims may be able to handle Demarcus Ware, but our backups won’t.
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Honestly, I don’t think Walt’s ready to retire. He’s got that problem with the medication he can and can’t take, and he’s always walked to the beat of his own drum, so it just seems like this healing process is going to take longer than normal, and it can, and it should if that’s what Walt wants to do. The absence of Walter alone is not what the problem is. It’s the fact that Locklear can’t stay healthy and that Ruskell has done nothing to upgrade the guard position. You can claim Wahle if you like, but that’s just taking another flyer on another washed up veteran. Sims was a fourth-rounder that didn’t pan out. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t, but you can’t claim a fourth-round choice as a concerted effort to improve the position, especially in light of what he let walk away.
I’ve been reading all the back and forth throughout Seahawks Nation between the supposed “fair weather, bandwagon” fans and the “true, real, there-from-the-start” fans who have predictably decided to bash their 12 brethren and taken up Hasselbeck’s argument that the season is long from over.
The bottom line is, this isn’t a very good football team, and it hasn’t been since a fateful trip to Green Bay in the snow.
The record speaks for itself: 6-16.
Blame the injuries if you want, but the real fault lies with Ruskell’s belief that the team needed to simply be re-tooled rather than rebuilt. He’s spent money toward the former, not the latter, and it’s left us worse off now than had he simply admitted that it was time to clean house in a few areas, suck up the losses and move toward the future. As it stands now, he still has the losses, but the process of rebuilding has been retarded.
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Great post. Couldn’t agree more.
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Agreed Bobby Ayala….
One point about O-Linemen and “talent”. Denver used highly talented O-Linemen in their heyday. Smaller than average yes, but no less talented. The NFL is a copycat league, so a lot of those smaller talented O-linemen are now getting snached up by other teams and the pool of available, smaller, talented O-linemen is empty. So, the ZBS magically making bad o-linemen good is a myth.
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BobbyAyala, I’m disappointed in the team too, dude, but I don’t get your comments.
“Blame the injuries if you want, but the real fault lies with Ruskell’s belief that the team needed to simply be re-tooled rather than rebuilt.” ??
TR “retooled” but didn’t “rebuild” the team? What does that even mean? Within salary cap restrictions, the team has spent big, and TR has replaced every player except for his all-pro QB, his all-pro CB, and two OTs. How is that not rebuilding?
I think its pretty clear that injuries are the problem.
Are the injuries Ruskell’s fault? Does he sneak up on player’s and whack them ‘Tonya Harding Style’ when they aren’t looking? Is he supposed to have two starters waiting at every position? What team has that?
“Sims was a fourth-rounder that didn’t pan out.”
What? I’m pissed that he sprained his ankle too, but during the first several games this year Sims outplayed anyone we’ve had at OG in several years (excepting Wahle’s very brief stint). Unger has a lot of improving to do before he is as good as Sims, and I don’t hear anyone complaining about him.
At this point, all I can say is injuries have definitely been the problem. Put Locklear and Sims in that Cardinals game and it would have been a completely different game. injuries have prevented development of the offense; its impossible to judge their talent or coaching with the O line in its current condition.
Don’t forget that Arizona and San Francisco have had some very uneven performances this season also; that’s why this season is not over for us yet.
I’m disappointed too, but I also think it will be awesome to watch this team struggle back from what they’ve been through. That’s what makes achievement in sport a great thing to watch.
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Is there anybody on offense you guys would say ranks in the top half in their positions in the NFL? By that I not only mean skill, but consistency and availability. I can think of Carlson and that’s it. So for instance, Sims would be a LG. Does he rank in the top half? Is Housh in the top half of number 1 WRs in the NFL?
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Lets go back to last Feb, before free agency and the draft.
Walter Jones, 35 years old, three shoulder surgeries, back issues, mirco surgery. Mike Wahle, a shoulder is bone against bone. Chris Spencer, shoulder and back issues two years in a row. Sean Locklear, missing multiple games three years in a row.
Nope, no way in hell to predict there might be O line injury issues.
Strange though. Several posters on this blog predicted exactly that.
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This line was in need of repair prior to last season. Mike Wahle was never a long term answer at LG. There were significant questions about Spencer and his health. Sims had been struggling at RG (not nearly as bad has is talked about here, but still) and Walter was in the twilight and talk had already begun about his eventual replacement, all this prior to start ’08. The fact the we are now in season 2 of decimating injuries in addition to those still questions have yet to be answered fall squarely on Ruskell, IMO. Yes this team is talented, especially on D (I love our young D) but complimentary pieces, no matter how talented, can make up for problems on the line that we all saw coming, IMO.
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The Dolphins have had luck with the Wildcat, so maybe we should try our own experiemental offense…we can call it the Oxcart Offense:
We sign 9 400+ pound Sumu wrestlers for the offensive ilne.
We sign the two fastest, meanest 280 pound LBs we can find to play fullback and halfback…they are Matt’s bodyguards on passing plays.
We sign seven 6’9 or taller former basketball players to play WR.
We can keep Carlson at TE and add a 7ft tall former basketball player for the other TE.
We rotate Matt and Seneca at QB; they can either run or toss passes over the defender’s heads so only our receivers can reach the ball.
We trade all of our offensive lineman and receivers for draft picks and use those picks to build the most dominant defense the NFL has ever seen.
We trade for the best punter, kicker, punt returner, and kick returner in the NFL.
Think we could convert on 3 and 1?!
LOL
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Audible – your answer is no. Cause the NFL class of DE and DT would eat your 9 400+ Sumu/OL lunch easily. If it was that easy we could just plug and play guys from the street.
What we need is a group of scouts who can find NFL caliber talent for the OL. It can’t be done in the middle of the season, and it cant be done in one season. There is no way for TR to magically gain this knowledge. And even if he did he wont be able to catch up in one season. This OL rebuilding that is needed will take years. Do you won’t TR the defensive “genius”, to do it?
BTW-I think the D is one or two players away from greatness. But the D wont score points and can’t stay on the field all day with out breaking down. We need a Offensive genius. And one with enough power to over-rule TR, unlike the end of the Holmy era.
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Geez can we have an edit button…
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I think you guys are right when you say that the O line was in need of more help before this season. That’s easy. But, as GM, how would you have done better than Ruskell?
Would you have not drafted Curry so that you could have drafted Andre Smith or Eugene Monroe instead? Those were about the best options at OT. Both players are sitting on the bench a lot this year.
And would you have not spent your FA money on Housh so that you could have signed a veteran OG or OT instead?
Those are likely the best options that Ruskell had in front of him before the season to sign new starters to the O line.
Here’s the OGs that were signed by new teams during free agency:
Adrian Jones – now injured at Texas
Joe Berger – now a backup for Dolphins
Jeremy Bridges – now a backup for Cardinals
Frank Omiyale – starting for Bears
And here are the OTs that were signed by new teams during free agency:
Stacy Andrews – now a backup for Raiders
Khalif Barnes – now a backup for Raiders
Damane Duckett – signed then cut by Patriots
George Foster – signed then cut by Bengals
Brandon Gorin – now a backup for Broncos
Marcus Johnson – now a backup for Bucs
Orlando Pace – starting for Bears, 33 yrs old
Ephrim Salam – now injured at Detroit, 33 yrs old
Tre Thomas – now a backup for Jaguars, 34 yrs old
Floyd Womak – now injured at Cleveland
So, exacly who is it that Ruskell was supposed to have signed for our O line instead of signing Curry and Housh? And how would that make us better?
I think TR did well to draft Curry and Unger, and I think he did well to spend his FA $ on Housh. If you guys have better experience at being a GM than TR, you need to send your resumes to Paul Allen.
We have five good starting linemen. They just need to get healthy and play a few games together.
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I too lie Curry and Unger and Like the addition of Housh. But instead of Butler how about TJ Lang (TL) or Seth Olson (LG) that were both available after they took Butler. Granted it may have been considered a reach because they didn’t have a 4th, but need comes into play the deeper the rounds get.
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*like*
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Duke, I’d vote for you for GM. lol! but beware, its a short-term job!
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Matt Hasselbeck and John Carlson rank in the top half of the NFL at their respective offensive positions. If you call TJ a #1, then I will say that Burleson definitely ranks in the top half of #2 WRs. Or if you want to call Burleson our #1, then TJ also definitely fits into the top half of WRs at his position. Basically, we have 3 players on offense who rank in the upper half of the NFL if you average it out. None of these are on the OL.
As has been mentioned many times, the QB won’t play like he’s in the top half of the NFL at his position if he’s continually getting killed (thanks to a terrible OL). The WR/TE won’t be able to play that well either since the OL isn’t allowing them enough time, on a consistent basis, to run their routes (by that time, the QB is on his back).
It sucks.
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Stevos – the scenario (in hindsight) that probably makes the most sense was to sign Jason Brown to play C. Then we’d have Sims/Spencer/Unger for Guard; it definitely would have helped the G position. Still did nothing about the outside though, but at least we’d have a strength up the middle (in comparison to what we have now). Myself, I’m not going to complain about this, because it’s not a scenario I advocated at the time. But it was an option that was not explored that would have made our OL much better. Oher was the best tackle in the draft and I continually got ripped for saying it. Oh well, I’ve said a lot of stupid stuff too that other people were right on.
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You know I’d really love have every OLineman be a 1st or 2nd round pick but the fact is Seattle’s draft and FA pickup went a certain way for a reason. Point to pretty much any draft dating back to 2005 and I could give you a good reason why they didn’t draft an OLineman in he 1st or 2nd round.
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BobbyK: “Myself, I’m not going to complain about this, because it’s not a scenario I advocated at the time. But it was an option that was not explored that would have made our OL much better.”
Well, I’m just guessing but I suppose one of the main reasons you weren’t advocating it was because you don’t own a crystal ball. Neither do the Seahawks management and coaching staff.
You can say the same thing about the 2008 catastrophe. Had they known ahead of time that they were going to lose all of their receivers before the season was barely underway then they could have headed it off at the pass by signing a couple of free agent wide outs.
You know, after the fact there are always lots of critics around who will tell you that they knew that Walter Jones was toast for the season and Wahle was done and all that stuff but they never really knew any such thing.
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earther, ain’t it the truth.
funny how no one ever comes online and says, “I guessed right about my prediction, and I was wrong about my seven other predictions.”
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Ruskell could have drafted Ben Grubbs instead of trading for Branch. He could have moved down in the draft and taken Michael Oher. Hey, I don’t know if this has ever been discussed on this blog but he could have franchised Hutch.
Abby, Tony, Tim, Leroy Jethro and Ziva could have made this a better O line.
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That’s the problem some have though, with the issues facing the o-line now. This has been building for some time. The groundwork for what they are facing now began in earnest in ’07. Don’t misunderstand what Bobby is saying, he was as big a proponent for taking a lineman and revamping the o line as there was on this blog, for this very reason. And while we may not have known for 100% certainty that Jones and Wahle were done, many, myself included, said here that was quite likely they were. This is not a situation that was unavoidable by any stretch.
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true, true, the o line situation was not unavoidable. But there are trade-offs. To add a player you have to subtract one. I was a big proponent for drafting Eugene Monroe. But even now I still would not trade him for Aaron Curry.
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I totally agree with that. What I take issue with is the apparent lack of preparation for what was coming. But they’re here now, and looking back does no good, other than to vent a bit. For my part I’m going to try looking forward and what they can do to fix it. And of course Dallas in a week and a half.
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“a player under contract to a club as a Practice Squad player is completely free to sign a contract with another NFL club during the season in order to be on the second club’s Active/Inactive (i.e., 53 man) list. A practice squad player may not sign an NFL Player Contract with his Club’s next opponent later than 4:00 p.m., New York time, on the sixth day preceding the game (except in bye weeks, when the prohibition commences on the tenth day preceding the game).If another club signs a Practice Squad player to its 53 man roster it does not have to provide any sort of compensation to the player’s former club but it generally must keep the player on the 53 man roster for at least 3 weeks, thereby mandating that he earns . . . the minimum first year salary for said 3 week period ($285,000 prorated weekly).”
Has this changed recently? I think grabbing PS players from other teams does not mean they can’t be placed on the inactive list for the next three games. But, since K.Williams is back on PS, guess they could Gibson on the active list but just as an emergency backup to McIntosh.
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Trading for Branch was suppose to but them over the top and hopefully win the SB. I don’t blame Ruskell for trying to do that. As far as the Other pick goes, it was pretty much a known fact that getting a team to trade down with Seattle was a longshot. Besides that, I would rather have Curry.
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As far as lack of preparation on the oLine goes, lets remember Ruskell drafted Jenning/Wilson to take over for Dyson/Herndon. Then Tapp and later for Wistrom. Like I mentioned earlier, there’s a reason for everything. You don’t draft a LT in the 1st round back in 2005 just to let him sit on the bench for 3 years and ignore your other needs.
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earth/steve – you’re getting defensive when what I was really trying to do is agree with you.
My only point about Jason Brown was that people have been writing stuff about FAs and how there was NO other options. Jason Brown was an option that nobody mentioned. And he’s 100 times better than anyone we have at the position. Still, I like Unger a lot (even though he isn’t all that good at RG at the moment) and am definitely excited about him growing into a player that, hopefully, next year we all put in the upper half of the NFL at their respective positions (joining Matt/Carlson).
oceanic wins my favorite post of the day though.
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not defensive here, Bobby, I agree with you as well. I wish a few decisions had gone differently. But hindsight is easy. I think that Ruskell’s decisions would look real good if a few key guys didn’t happen to be injured.
We all look back at our GM’s decisions and we see 4 or 5 big mistakes. Ruskell probably looks back at his own work as sees 30 mistakes and 300 good decisions that a lesser GM might have screwed up.
you get my vote for post of the day, Bobby:
” Oh well, I’ve said a lot of stupid stuff too that other people were right on.”
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It would be fun to go back a couple years and re-read our “arm-chair GM” posts. Lol. I suspect we’d all be humbled.
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I loved the Branch trade. But I was mad we didn’t have that pick when it came time to miss out on Ben Grubbs.
I really thought Lock needed to get resigned and was happy when Ruskell got the deal done before FA. Turns out that sucked. It’s a lot of money for a guy who has been injured his fare share of time since, and not overly effective at all other times.
I wanted Phillips (FS) or Merling (DE) when Ruskell took LoJack. Guess that really doesn’t matter. Looks like all three are fine.
If I were GM there would probably be people complaining beyond belief about me (but we’d still have Hutch) too. And with good reason on many FA signings and draft picks. I doubt anyone else would be perfect either.
Wanted Moreno or Oher over Curry/Sanchez. Verdict still out.
la, la, la…
I do appreciate that Ruskell has gone out and been aggressive when he’s seen something and wanted it. It has usually turned out well, mainly with trading multiple picks to get his guy. Unger may suck right now, but you can tell he’s a player and needs a little time before he becomes rock solid.
Woulda, coulda, shoulda… If the Vikings wouldn’t have pulled the crap they did with respect to Hutch and if John Abraham wouldn’t have declined coming here, even though Ruskell offered more money than Atlanta did, I have a feeling we’d have another Super Bowl appearance and we’d be toasting Ruskell right now and not condemning him. Remember – we offered the Kelly Jennings pick for Abraham, who is one of the top pass rushing DEs in the NFL (what a difference he’d make on our D).
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Dukeshire: “And while we may not have known for 100% certainty that Jones and Wahle were done, many, myself included, said here that was quite likely they were.”
Well, Walter Jones isn’t done. Not yet anyway and frankly I don’t think predicting that 32 year old Mike Wahle was finished prior to this season was very sensible at all. That is, unless the predictor is privy to information about his injury that I, for one, didn’t know about. Wahle retired young for an offensive lineman. I generally file predictions like that under the too common myth that players over 30 are on a slippery slope to obscurity.
Personally I stopped forming opinions about retirement probabilities way back when Joe Montana came back and played 4 more years after that burst disk. That’s just me of course.
The point is I don’t think anybody would be trying to remind anybody else of anything they might have said about Walter Jones’ or Mike Wahle’s demise if things hadn’t panned out the way they have. You can say that the current situation is a problem that is a long time coming but in my opinion Seattle had a very strong Offensive front going into training camp. Play it out all over again and I would still expect the same thing. I didn’t know they were going to get all crippled up like they have and if we were able to do it again I still wouldn’t assume such a thing. In fact, after three bad injury years in a row, I was assuming just the opposite. The worm’s got to turn sooner or later, doesn’t it?
If you did know these things before the fact then kudos to you but I still think that kind of insight requires a crystal ball.
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BobbyK: “I loved the Branch trade.”
At the time I thought it was a bad trade but once the deed is done it’s water under the bridge, isn’t it? It has to be. You have to concede that those guys know their organization a lot better than I do. At that point you just say, “O.K… Seattle has a good new receiver. Jurevicius is gone and I’m not exactly in love with Darryl Jackson so it’s good, right?”
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Stevos — My point on Sims is this. He was God awful his first season, missed his entire second season, and has missed almost his entire third season. He was a slow-starter at Ohio State as well and came around his senior season, and that gives me hope. But considering he was brought in to replace a future HOFer, you can’t claim he’s been anything but a bust.
Here’s my opinion on injured players: If you aren’t on the field, you aren’t earning your paycheck, you aren’t helping the team win, and you are failing.
Some are more forgiving than others and rack it up to bad luck. Well, then those same people can’t claim that Brett Favre, or Will Witherspoon, or Peyton Manning are great because they keep themselves on the field, they simply must say those players are extremely lucky.
The truth of the matter lies somewhere in them middle, as with all issues, but if you’re grading out a player, you can only grade what he has or hasn’t contributed, and Rob Sims has contributed next to nothing.
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I don’t know what to tell you. When Wahle went on the IR with season ending shoulder surgery (his second one in two years on that shoulder) I said on this blog that I thought his body was in decline and as soon as they could (teams cannot release players on IR) they would let him go. As for Walt, when I read his surgery was microfracture it was very likely he too had (sadly) played his last game as a Seahawk. I was crushed on this blog for both views. It was an opinion that panned out. (When you shoot your mouth off as often as I do, that’s bound to happen. lol). But I don’t feel it took a crystal ball in either case. And Walt may still prove me wrong. But to say that one cannot predict that players who repeatedly are injured will again likely get injured is foolish. Based on ’07 and ’08, I resist that the notion that this current situation they face on the o-line was unpredictable. That’s not hindsight it’s a lack of preparation.
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As for the re-tooling as opposed to rebuilding. TR has spent a lot of money in free agency to bring in aging veterans in an attempt to keep the playoff run going.
Think Pat Kerney, the two safeties, Julian Peterson, and the like. Look at what Tampa is doing this season, they have more cap space than any other team in the league and they are developing a strong youth movement and taking a lot of lumps along the way.
As those younger players develop, sometime down the road Tampa will have saved itself enough money to bring in top-tier playmaking talent to infuse with the base and take it to the next level.
I guess what I really mean is, rather than spending a lot of money on a bunch of older, mediocre talent in order to plug the gaps and try to keep the playoff ship afloat. Save the money, let the ship sink, build the youth, and explode back onto the scene a few years from now.
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Rob sims has been a bust and i’ll tell you why he will continue to be such even when he’s on the field…………………short !@#$-ing arms!!!!! what good is claiming heaviest bench press when your arms can’t even reach out and touch the opposing d-line???? He will always suck because in the NFL it’s more technique than brute strength, and that’s all sims has is brute strength.
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Good call duke
“But I don’t feel it took a crystal ball in either case. And Walt may still prove me wrong. But to say that one cannot predict that players who repeatedly are injured will again likely get injured is foolish. Based on ’07 and ’08, I resist that the notion that this current situation they face on the o-line was unpredictable. That’s not hindsight it’s a lack of preparation.”
Cya TR
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As it stands, Ruskell’s philosophy of undersized motor guys hasn’t panned out, because these high character guys, as great as they are for the PR department, get their skulls bashed in every Sunday and they make their way to the DL.
His theory of fast, smaller players hasn’t worked out, because he’s the only dude in the league that builds a team that way.
One injury-plagued season is an aberration. But we’re past that year now. It’s no longer a freak occurrence but a trend. What good is Ruskell’s lightning-fast defense if the starters are never on the field?
Fitzgerald and Boldin are slow-footed bruising receivers. Do you think Arizona gives a flying you-know-what? The Cards have had the same starting O-Line for 22 consecutive games.
It’s a matter of philosophy, and Ruskell’s is proving to be faulty.
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The fact of the matter is that Mike Wahle was released by Carolina because of his shoulder. You can say it was saving money. You can say it was b/c they wanted to go with a more “mauling” type of blocking scheme that he didn’t fit into as much (a healthy Wahle would have been fine in that system, by the way). The fact is that I heard the term “bone-on-bone” before he signed with us (i.e. the main reason Carolina didn’t want him anymore). Even though I didn’t have an x-ray delivered to my house and had a doctor analyze it… it certainly is a red flag. I think the Seahawks were thinking they could get by with it and I believed them. If he was going to be okay for a couple of years, then I certainly think that would have been a great signing. Actually, I thought he played pretty well last year until he hurt it AGAIN. I was happy with the signing thinking that the organization had the right doctor info that would make the term “bone on bone” less frightful. Same with microfracture surgery for a 35 year old guy who weighs over 300lbs.
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earther – “… but in my opinion Seattle had a very strong Offensive front going into training camp” I felt that way then, too. Shallow, but strong when healthy. However, it was at best a calculated risk to assume they would remain or return to health based on the previous 2 season.
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BobbyA,
you need a direct line to TR.
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I don’t think Walt is done either. Call me crazy, but I think he’s going to have a fine ’10 (if he’s kept around). He will be well over a year removed from microfracture surgery and, like most others who have had it, will be ready to go by then. He won’t be the Walt we all know and love, but, hey, he’s getting old and his play will have fallen. But a Walt like him will still be better than 85% of all other LTs in the NFL. For 2009, however, this does us no good.
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Just look at our all-world linebacking corps.
At the end of 2009, the unit will have played one half of football together the entire season.
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Regarding Rob Sims, he actually had a very promising 1st season. He actually looked like an answer at guard. That’s why his awful 2nd and 3rd seasons were such huge disappointments.
Even if one had predicted Jones and Wahle would be gimpy – what to do? Cut them in the offseason? That’s the only way to have “prepared” for their loss. Waiting until camp (as they did with Wahle) wouldn’t have mattered since you would have been in the same boat (limited options) as now.
So if people were calling for Jones and Wahle to be released in the offseason to make room for replacements, sure, but I don’t remember hearing too much of that, and anyway I certainly would never have treated Walter Jones that way, not if there was any decent hope he’d play again.
I believe trying to reload (patch things together for another run) was the correct thing to do last year. Many of the moves struck me as an attempt to load up for Holmgren’s final season (the Wahle signing, even the horrible Colbert trade as a desperate attempt to hold the receiver fort together.)
If we go into full rebuild mode, we’re writing off a couple of seasons of Matt Hasselbeck. In hindsight, being 4-12 last year and things looking bad this year, it’s easy to say the rebuilding should have started last year. But as a fan I would have been livid if Seattle basically had given up last year, or this year..
And if you think the GM is getting hate now, imagine if he had started tearing down the team while Hasselbeck was still (presumably) in his prime, and Holmgren was in his last year. How many “Ruskell destroyed the Supert Bowl” team comments would we have had then?
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“I felt that way then, too. Shallow, but strong when healthy.”
I thought they had strong depth too. With Wahle still in the equation even Willis was going to be relegated to backup and he, Wrotto and Vallos all have good game experience with all the injuries they’ve been having. I didn’t expect Unger to get anything short of some rotational snaps to get him a little bit acclimated.
Heh, even the regular backups have been getting injured. Just shows you my powers of prognostication, eh?
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Do you think Ruskell would look back and think the Hutch decision and the throw all that money at 30 year old Alexander were bad decisions? My feel for the Ruskell era offensive line issues, and the downfall of the Seahawks starts right there. Womak – how much did he need to hang around here. They have thrown a bunch of dollars at the defense, particularly the LB corp. With some of that Lofa and Alexander money what could they have done in the FA? Could they have thought, just maybe the whole left side of the line was old/injury prone? I’m not GM material, and I dont get paid to be either. TR is both, and makes bad decisions regarding the OL, and pass protection in general (aka Alexander).
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Sorry, Indy and Tampa Bay also follow the philosophy of undersized, high motor guys, especially on defense. Both have won Super Bowls this decade.
Marcus Trufant is hurt. Undersized guy? Walter Jones? Chris Spencer? Sims? Burleson last year? The most famous injury that made Seattle’s defense ordinary – Marcus Tubbs? (not a Ruskell pick BTW either.) For that matter, is Matt Hasselbeck a “undersized, high motor guy?”
There’s no correlation between their size and the injury status. Not even that much correlation between a Ruskell-picked and non-Ruskell player, really.
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The difference between Indy and Tampa’s Super Bowl teams was that fact that Indy and Tampa both had beyond-dominant units on one side of the ball.
In the postseason, Tampa’s defensive dominance inspired it’s offense to play up, and they did. Indy’s defense came along in their run to the championship.
Ruskell has attempted to build a dominant unit on the defensive side of the ball with heady, undersized players, Lofa, Wilson, Jennings, Russell, Darby, Tapp, and aging FA’s, Kerney, Grant, Peterson, and it hasn’t panned out.
There absolutely is a point where you have to stop blaming “bad luck” for everything that goes wrong with this football team.
It’s a trend.
6-16 and counting.
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Very smart article to Seattle Seahawks problems.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/276174-calling-all-seahawks-fire-tim-ruskell-look-ahead-to-2010?utm_source=newsletter
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That was a darn good article , Cyrreen!!!!
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As someone who has probably read every comment on the blog for few years, I know of nobody, myself included, who advocated releasing Walt this past off-season.
Like I said in the previous post, I don’t think (hope) he’s done. However, a better plan should have been in place, as it’s hard to expect him to be ready for the ’09 season (definitely at least the 1st half of the year). And most people felt that way on this blog 6 months ago too.
As bad as I thought Sims was… I thought he was terrible “depth” coming into the season. Hell, he’s probably been our best OL up to this point (which isn’t saying much). I do like Willis too. And I will like Unger in a year or two… but his production is not good now.
And what has Spencer done for us to be so optimistic about him? Get hurt on a regular basis? Be bad when he has had game time on a regular basis?
Having a bunch of bodies, but nobody overly good/durable isn’t a good recipe and when a bunch of injury risks get hurt… then you can’t use the injury card when they get hurt. But, hey, you can get away with it in the ZBS.
If a guy who normally doesn’t get hurt gets hurt… that sucks and is bad luck. But if players with injury history the last few seasons get hurt, is that really bad luck?
Sims? Injury problems for a few years.
Spencer? Plenty of injury problems for a few years now.
Wahle? The shoulder injuries.
Walt? Microfracture.
Lock? Been hurt and missed time. The theme here is that with each of these players (minus Walt) there have been serious enough injuries the last 2-3 years in a row for all of them to miss time.
If we had a bunch of OL who had been relatively healthy the last few years and this injury bug hit… well, that’s bad damn luck.
But if you have a bunch of injury prone players, should you really complain when you have so many injuries?
If I wish in one hand and take a dump in the other… I know which hand I’ll have something in. It seems like we wished our OL would stay healthy in one hand instead of doing something about it besides drafting Unger.
Yes. We can complain we have had bad luck. However, I think we ignorantly created some of this bad luck too.
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Seattle did a good thing, raiding another teams practice squad for an O lineman rather than getting someone who has been idle for 10 weeks.
Gibson may not be kept after this season but then again he has to be better than someone who was not picked up off waivers. He could also play his way onto the 2010 team.
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Yes, CRYGREEN, very good article.
I hope we don’t get a GM who gives up on morals in most cases and goes for the (attempted) win. I appreciate this about Ruskell. And I think Ruskell, overall, has done a good job with the exception of our OL. If he can “fix” this, I honestly think he has built a Super Bowl type of team. I really do. However, saying this AGAIN for the 4th year in a row, he can’t neglecting this unit the way he has. I can see Allen giving him another year b/c of the injuries. It’s not normal to have this many injuries on a team. However, like I said in my previous post… when you get injury prone players and expect them to be healthy… that’s not really smart.
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That’s where I would pin accountability on Ruskell. It’s not the straw man of picking “small” players. It’s that he’s poured a lot of resources into the defense with relatively little to show for it.
Compared to the offense, the defense has been healthy last year and this year, but instead of carrying the team it has only held its own at best. (Usually worse.) Even if the defense weren’t top 5, given what’s been poured into it, it ought be to borderline top 10 (only the upper 3rd of the league) even with injuries factored in.
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The small player thing is tougher to rationalize considering they now have one one the biggest d-lines in football.
CRYGREEN – Decent article. I certainly agree that Ruskell must go and as unreasonable as it is (not even half way through the year) I too would like to see Knapp go. I suspect if they get a new GM he’ll have Mora make some adjustments to his staff. And Wilson missed to games, hardly “significant” time. As far as 2010; Tebow and Snead had better not step foot anywhere near Seattle. And Best, if he continues on this way, likely will be long gone in the 2nd. But all in all yes, Ruskell’s not the man to correct these issues (the ones he’s allowed to fester)
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But Duke — No one on the D-Line has been hurt, save for Kerney.
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I don’t see our problems being the D-line. They are on the field far too much and often times in poor field position. It would also help to throw in some blitz packages and not rely so heavily on the standard 4 man rush. Except for a couple missed gap assignments in the SF game(and Mebane was out) I feel like the D-line has for the most part done a decent job. Now don’t get me wrong, if we were able to secure a Dominant Noseguard to go with Mebane, by all means I’m for it. But, Cole seems to be quite serviceable, and probably one of the least of our concers. IMO those three early picks next year need to be used on OL, OL, RB. I don’t know who will become available as far as F/A safeties, but that needs to be addressed as well. And as much as I hate to say it, we could address another need by dealing some of the LB talent we have.
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Thank you for the positive feedback on my article!
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