Words of Prey, Seahawks-Cardinals: Bullying, dastardly defense, and a ‘Jax trick’ in the desert

While a mathematically desirous outcome, Seahawks 31, Cardinals 7, doesn’t really tell the full story of Seattle’s tenth straight win over their Sunset End Zone State rivals. And yet, in something of a pleasing paradox, it does. Because the way it began, which is competitively, matches exactly how uncompetitively it ended.

‘Twas a close game for a half because the Seahawks are a complete team and the spunky Cardinals aren’t quite there yet. So, makes sense the hosts could hang with the defending champs for a minute or thirty. Until the disparity made itself clear, which is when this brutally efficient Seahawks team began to stomp on some throats, and the Seattle defense handed the ball off to their offense to finish the job.

Oh, they finished it all right.

On a day the story could be Jaxon Smith-Njigba’s hat trick (Jax trick?), or the defense’s usual dominance, or Drew Lock’s outright elite quarterbacking from the backup position, the offensive line stole the show. They got to crunch time and told the Cards defense, out loud, for all who had eyes to hear, “You guys thought you would do some football, but now we will do the football. You can watch, if you’d like.”

Witness 3rd and eight, halfway through a 16-play, 10-minute drive.

Fifteen plays were runs. The lone pass was a third-down dart to JSN.

It went, if you’ll forgive the glorious repetitiveness: Emanuel Wilson for 18, Wilson for 3, George Holani for 5, pass on the money, Wilson for no gain, Wilson for 2, the play pictured above, Wilson for 7, Wilson for 7 again, Wilson twice more for 1 each time, Holani for 6 plus the inevitable frustration penalty, then the four short runs culminating in A.J. Barner’s vulturian touchdown.

The offense ran between 41 and 48 seconds off the clock each time, save for clock stoppages outside their control. It was a masterclass in imposing your will on a lesser team in their own house. And the Seahawks are the ones who did it.

To cement the best game I’ve seen them play since they hung 46-350-5 on the ground vs. the Giants in 2014, the offensive line permitted only three QB hits on Lock.

Let’s give everyone their due, though. The story can be about more than one outstanding play, player, position group or side of the ball. Why not? This is the most complete team in the league right now, period. Nobody need be greedy with the praise. There is more than enough to go around. It’s a renewable resource you know.

Three of these. Remember the decade of consciously not drafting a Seahawks receiver early on for your fantasy team? If so, forget it this instant. Three of these! This is your WR1. This is maybe everyone’s WR1:

This is your backup quarterback. Maybe everyone’s backup quarterback, if the other 31 fanbases had a say:

I’m one more great Lock outing away from legally changing his first name to TheDrewth. He’s been that good since Sam Darnold’s season took an involuntary detour on the first drive. Against the Patriots there were money throws under pressure; against the Cardinals there were yards-seeking missiles hitting his receivers square in the hands. I’d argue that without the Rashid Shaheed and JSN drops, Lock’s stats could be even shinier. He’s outplaying his stat line, which already conveys elite production.

Yes, he’s gotten away with two super interceptable throws and has personally bitten off the nails of every fan with his propensity to snap the ball between :01 and :00. But honestly, those are offenses Darnold is just as guilty of committing. There has been no discernible drop-off between QB1 and QB2, and in case the standings matter, Seattle is 2-0.

For as good as the OL, the All-Pro, and the backup have been, the defense has outdone them with stunning regularity, however.

Between the McBride catch that tied things and the Barnyard plunge that iced them, the Seattle defense was nigh impenetrable. They allowed Arizona to run 12 plays for 19 yards. They permitted less than six minutes of possession, took the ball away, and no single gain went for more than nine. In fact, they kept the Cards from gaining double digits on any play, until once on the final garbage drive.

Post-McBride touchdown, Arizona didn’t run a play for positive yards in Seattle territory until their final snap of the game. One meaningless gain to run out the clock.

And 3.2 yards per play is a way to remind your rivals who’s in charge of the division still. I could start with the superlatives, but then it’d be impossible to quit.

You know this already, the Seahawks are anything but box score warriors. Julian Love made another disturbingly handsome play with the fingertip pick between blades of grass, Derick Hall is a constant menace with or without the short shorts, and the hornet-like swarming of defenders to the ball continues. Every week the defensive line is stouter than a Guinness. Drake Thomas is oft the forgotten man amidst a sea of stars, until he streaks into the backfield like the comet he is:

Seattle’s unsolvable roadrunner defense turned Jacoby Brissett into Wile E. Coyote. Handed an entire barrel of TNT in Trey McBride, the only explosion Brissett managed was blowing everything up in his own face.

So, yeah, 31-7 was pretty dang fair. Let’s see how we got there and name some predators and prey along the way.

Your Predator-Prey encounter of the quarter isn’t difficult to locate. It comes on the Seahawks’ opening drive, congrats on calling it ahead of time, it’s Jaxon Smith-Njigba creating the most open touchdown of his young-ish career. Also happened to be his longest reception ever. Collateral prey on the play includes two DBs, not one: Will Johnson and Budda Baker.

The Cardinals had actually started auspiciously enough, with a big return to the 43 then a nifty completion to Trey McBride past midfield on their first offensive snap. We had the appearance of a game, which lasted exactly until halftime.

Even though Arizona’s drive stalled right away in short yardage and later downs and even though the ensuing JSN touchdown on Seattle’s second play of the game made it 7-0, and even though the teams traded punts, the Cardinals early on looked rather like the team that upset the Chargers in Week 1. They looked even more the part when they drove for their only points of the game as the first quarter ended.

To all who could objectively observe, it looked like the Cards had found a formula to keep pace. Get into favorable second downs, take advantage of over-aggressive Seahawks coverage, feed McBride, and don’t wimp out at the goal line.

Arizona’s plan worked perfectly for exactly one possession. Their other nine did not yield similar results. Yes, McBride had five early catches to extend his NFL record streak in that category for tight ends. Yes, they forced a fumble (something to monitor for Jadarian Price, given his college reputation). Yes, Brissett tossed it for nine again right away on first down, and that’s when the defense had had enough. Thomas’s play from above came next, and starting with his TFL, the Seattle deluge.

Seahawks defense:

Q2: 12 plays for 46 yards, two first downs allowed, no points

Q3: 9 plays for 19 yards, one first down, no points

Q4 excluding last drive: 3 plays for 1 yard, no first downs, no points

I know this is the same way of stating what’s already been stated, but from the time the game was 7-7 until it stopped mattering, the Cardinals averaged 22 yards and one first down per quarter. No wonder they didn’t score again.

A great choice for the second quarter’s Predator and Prey moment is Price’s reaction to his first (won’t be last) career fumble. On his next very handoff, he ran left, found a crease and decided to play Predator by lowering the shoulder a little on safety Andrew Wingard, the unfortunate Prey Du Jour.

That’s how you put an early rookie error behind you.

The Seahawks didn’t score on this possession but moved the ball well, with completions to Barner and handoffs to Emanuel Wilson. An egregious Shaheed drop in field goal range meant another (excellent) Michael Dickson punt. The defense, now in Dark Mode, produced a three and out; a late hit on the return put the Seahawks 31 yards away from taking the lead right away. And but for a lack of creativity from first-time playcaller Brian Fleury, they would’ve, too.

Price converted third and two, JSN being himself set Seattle up inside the 10, but four straight runs up the gut got them no closer than the one-foot line. Armed with a chance to take the lead before half, the Cardinals put together a mini-drive lasting four minutes and covering a quarter of the field, during which the most weirdness was a sharpie delay and a phantom flag for 11 men on the field.

After a dozen years of continuous stupid shenanigans in Glendale, we will f—kin’ take that level of quirkiness, thank you very much.

With only 25 seconds to mount a two-minute drive, the Seahawks stalled on their own side of the field, so to halftime we went, knotted at seven, in the competitive game that had exhausted all its competitiveness.

Predator: Hall on the sequence that became Love’s snowcone interception. Prey: poor Paris Johnson Jr, the Cardinals left tackle. Hall had already owned Johnson on the preceding snap. Here he is indirectly causing the takeaway:

But the quarter began with something usually reserved for non-Cardinals games — a smattering of fumble good luck, as provided by Chazz Surratt, Mr. Right Place Right Time Right Hands.

Given what amounted to a bonus possession, the Seahawks offense went to work. Price found 25 yards and the wherewithal to keep his off hand on the ball through the tackle. Wilson snaked for two on first and goal, Price’s run to the left was smartly snuffed out, and that’s when Fleury remembered the best receiver in football was on his team. Slant to Jax, 14-7, no looking back the rest of the way.

Back on defense, an open-field Devon Witherspoon tackle stuck the Cardinals in 3rd and 7, leading to Hall’s pressure off the edge and Love’s interception. On the cliff of all-she-wrote territory, Seattle added a valuable field goal off the turnover, made another quick stop, Lock delivered another touchdown toss to the reigning and future Offensive Player of the Year. Quick stop once more, and it was all bullying the rest of the way with mistake-free football until everyone could hear “Sea-Hawks!” chants on the broadcast. It sounds so simple put that way. Maybe when you DO NOT CARE, it can be simple. Has anyone told that Mike Macdonald guy he might be up to something good?

It’s all been said, except for the formality of naming a Predator for this quarter: the OL. All of them. Prey: the Cardinals DL. All of them. Hey, it was a group project, as outlined above.

Honorable mention Predator for Jarran Reed, however, who devoured his man and the quarterback in one bite on third down, forcing a white-flag punt.

Let’s close with a time of possession stat, which is always overrated until the week it isn’t. The Cardinals held the ball for 5:43 in the second half, excluding their inconsequential two plays at the end. The Seahawks? 23:06 and it felt like longer. Mercy. (There was none.)

Trying this out for a few weeks — a postscriptum of assorted thoughts that didn’t find their way into the narrative.

JSN: He might be the kind of receiver who can turn anyone into a starting QB, a la Justin Jefferson or Terrell Owens. He’s of course working with some pretty good raw materials in Lock, who read him like a book on every cut. The extra week of practice almost certainly helped, but let’s not discount just yet the possibility of Jaxon, QB whisperer.

More king: Besides the late Barnyard that could’ve easily been a FG attempt, JSN has all of the team’s touchdowns through two games. Not sustainable? Sure. But in the early going, with the offense generally struggling in the first half, a superstar is allowed to carry you so you only see one set of footprints in the sand. For a while.

Scoring drives the Seattle defense has allowed through two weeks of the new season:

• 1 yard pass after big DPI on an underthrown ball (the offense’s best secret weapon)
• Field goal after roughing the punter penalty (drive did not gain another first down)
• 2 yard pass on fourth down (to the game’s most productive TE)

Those are all the scoring drives, all of ’em. The Seahawks defense has forced more turnovers than they’ve allowed scores.

12 time: Ninth straight regular season win. 12th overall, if you remember the postseason and want to count it. I very much want to count it.

We got ourselves one question answered early this season: who’s the most complete squad in the league, top to bottom? You guys, no need to mince words, it’s our Seahawks. They might not be the best team in the end, and it’s only Week 2, but all the early returns indicate they’re the team with the fewest holes and the most paymakers. Not playmakers; not a typo. Guys who can make you pay. JSN, Shaheed, Kupp, both quarterbacks. The entire offensive line. Any one of the 15 starters on a defense that is getting healthier by the game. The Seahawks are loaded with paymakers.

A team like that has no ceiling.

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