Cleanup man Mora returns 'home' to fix Seahawks

By GREGG BELL
AP Sports Writer

SEATTLE — Jim Mora spent part of his youth in suburban
Seattle cleaning the visiting locker room when he worked as an
attendant at the old Kingdome.

Three decades later, the 47-year-old new head coach of the
Seahawks is still cleaning up messes.

He’s trying to wipe away his messy ending in Atlanta three
seasons ago, when he was fired two years after reaching the NFC
championship game with the Falcons as a rookie coach.

He’s now responsible for fixing up a Seattle team after a 4-12
season in 2008 – the Seahawks’ worst in 16 years.

“We were pretty terrible,” said three-time Pro Bowl quarterback
Matt Hasselbeck, who missed the majority of last season’s mess
with a bad back he says has healed.

Mora’s making no promises that Seattle will again rule the NFC
West, as it had for four consecutive years before last season.

Mora, a workout fanatic who worked his way onto Don James’
powerhouse Washington Huskies as a walk-on linebacker in 1981,
relentlessly pushes his players and assistants with brutal
honesty and is preaching, above all, patience.

“I would say that I’m probably a little more measured and
patient than I was my first time around … maybe less
reactionary,” Mora said a few days before this second coaching
gig begins Sunday against St. Louis. “I was very fortunate to
have a head job. Then once I lost it, to be put in a position
where I was able to sit for two years and work with one of the
best there ever was, that was very, very beneficial to me.”

For the last several years under departed coach Mike Holmgren,
the Seahawks’ main goals were winning the division and securing
home-field advantage. Having a bye and two playoff games inside
Qwest Field was how Seattle reached its only Super Bowl at the
end of the 2005 season.

Now, Mora has the humbled Seahawks focused on a more modest
goal.

“What we’re trying to do as a team is just keep the focus
narrow,” Mora said. “We’re not trying to win the division. We’re
not trying to get home-field this week. That’s not our goal. Our
goal is just to win one game. And I think our guys understand
that.”

There are other differences between these Seahawks and those of
the last decade under Holmgren:

-Mora’s birds won’t just fly. His offense is far from Holmgren’s
finesse-based, pass-first philosophy. Greg Knapp, Mora’s
offensive coordinator in Atlanta, installed the zone-blocking
and one-step-and-go running game that has finished in the top 10
in the NFL in rushing for eight consecutive seasons, in San
Francisco, Atlanta and Oakland. The primary runner is Julius
Jones, the former lead back in Dallas. He will run behind Justin
Griffith, the Falcons’ fullback when Mora and Knapp were in
Atlanta through 2006. Leading active rusher Edgerrin James,
signed last month after Arizona released him, will complement
Jones.

-Mora’s Seahawks will attack more on defense. Seattle acquired
bullish Cory Redding from Detroit to play end opposite two-time
Pro Bowler Patrick Kerney. That was in the trade of dynamic but
aging outside linebacker Julian Peterson. The deal created the
job for fourth overall pick Aaron Curry. So far, Curry has
provided what the Seahawks hoped they would get for their $34
million guaranteed. In the preseason, the dynamic rookie slammed
quarterbacks, ran down ball carriers and even dropped into the
secondary for six defensive-back sets.

The Seahawks think Arizona unseating them in 2008 was an
aberration. They believe game-breaking wide receiver Nate
Burleson looking superhuman less than a year after
reconstructive knee surgery and the signing of free-agent T.J.
Houshmandzadeh, following three consecutive seasons with 90 or
more catches for Cincinnati, will make for a more lethal
offense.

“I feel like this should be my best season as far as yards and
touchdowns, give or take one or two, for my career,”
Houshmandzadeh said, “if the coaches call my number like I think
they are.”

But if the offensive line doesn’t get healthy soon, Hasselbeck
may not last long enough to find him.

Nine-time Pro Bowl left tackle Walter Jones, 35 and coming off a
second knee surgery in eight months a few weeks ago, will miss
his first season opener in six years. So will center Chris
Spencer, though Mora said both have a chance to play in Week 2
at San Francisco. With left tackle Mike Wahle released after
failing a training camp physical, three-fifths of the starting
line is out.

And if Seattle’s defensive secondary isn’t better, that
“aberration” of sinking in the West will become a pattern.

The defense allowed a team-record 259 yards passing per game
last season, the most in the NFL. Cornerback Marcus Trufant, a
Pro Bowler in 2007, will miss at least six games with a disk
issue in his back similar to the one that ruined Hasselbeck’s
2008. Josh Wilson, who’s replacing Trufant, is barely 5-foot-9.
That was the reason Seattle signed bigger free agent Ken Lucas
to start at cornerback over Wilson.

The safeties are 30-year-old Deon Grant, promoted nickel back
Jordan Babineaux and Lawyer Milloy, a 35-year-old who is the
oldest non-kicker on the team.

Yet those potential problems are not curbing Mora’s enthusiasm.

“This is my home town, my home team, and team I grew up watching
and working for in many different roles. So there’s certainly a
level of excitement there,” he said. “It really hasn’t hit me so
far. I’m sure that it will at some point. Probably Sunday, right
before kickoff.”