Why Are the Seattle Seahawks Free Falling?

By Derek Lofland

The NFL has had a lot of surprising developments in 2008. Brett Favre wearing Green and White over Green and Gold has been a strange occurrence to say the least. Watching Matt Cassel throw touchdown passes instead of reigning MVP Tom Brady has taken some getting used to.

Seeing the Arizona Cardinals on the verge of clinching a division title is something that fans under 35 years old don’t remember seeing in their lifetime. To see them have a four game lead with six games to play is shocking news out of The Desert.

However, one story that is flying under that radar has been the sudden fall of the Seattle Seahawks reign over the NFC West. While I actually picked the Cardinals to win the NFC West and had the Hawks sitting at 8-8, missing the playoffs by one game I could never have imagined the Seahawks losing their eighth game in Week 11.

One reason this is such a shocking development is because of Mike Holmgren. Holmgren became a head coach for the first time in 1992 when he took over the Green Bay Packers. He has just two losing seasons in the NFL. That would be a 6-10 campaign his second year with the Seahawks back in 2000. He also finished 7-9 in 2002. His career winning percentage headed into this season was 157-99 or .613.

Holmgren has won seven division titles, coached in four NFC Championship Games, appeared in three Super Bowls, winning his only title back in 1996. He is one of only five coaches to lead two different franchises to the Super Bowl. The others are Don Shula, Dick Vermeil, Bill Parcells, and Dan Reeves. He has coached the MVP of the NFL in four different seasons. Brett Favre in 1995, 1996, and 1997 and Shaun Alexander in 2005.

There are not many coaches that can say they coached a quarterback that passed for 30 touchdowns five straight years and coached a running back that rushed for 14 touchdowns five straight years. Most coaches are known for having a running mentality or a passing mentality. Mike Holmgren has coached offenses that finished in the top 10 in points scored nine times and in yards gained 10 times.

He has done it with both pass oriented teams and run dominated teams. This is one of the best offensive minds the NFL has seen over the last 25 years. He is one of the best coaches at taking his West Coast Offensive philosophy and using it to the strengths of his team.

His coaching tree is legendary. There are two main coaching trees that dominate the NFL today. The Bill Parcells tree and the Bill Walsh tree. No assistant has helped the Walsh tree expand as much as Mike Holmgren.

Jon Gruden, Andy Reid, Steve Mariucci, Dick Jauron, Marty Mornhinweg, Mike Sherman, and Ray Rhodes have all coached under his tutelage either in Green Bay or Seattle. All were given NFL head coaching jobs based on their performances as his assistants.

So given that list of accomplishments it seems unbelievable that in his last season coaching the Seahawks that his team would lay an egg like they have. Holmgren was pretty much a lame duck coach in 1998 when he left Green Bay for Seattle. That team was able to finish 11-5. I refuse to believe that Mike Holmgren has packed it in. You don’t have the level of success he has had in the NFL without a 100% commitment to winning.

There are a number of things that have gone wrong in Seattle this season. Here would my top 5 reasons why Seattle is struggling in 2008.

1) Injuries at the Quarterback and Wide Receiver. It is one thing to have a lot of injuries. It is another to have them concentrated on one side of the ball. Matt Hasselbeck has missed five games this season with an injury. Deion Branch is coming off an ACL tear. He has not been at full strength for much of the year. Bobby Engram was injured in training camp and missed the first three games of the NFL season.

Nate Burleson injured his knee in the opener and has been out for the year. Maurice Morris missed three games. He is their big receiving threat out of the backfield. It got so bad they had to sign Korren Robinson and Kerry Colbert off of waivers just to get someone on the roster that could catch the football.

Every team has injuries and every team’s fans love to use the injury excuse as a reason for why their season went bad. Usually it is just an excuse for poor play. The Seahwawks are a team I will give a pass to for their injuries at the start of the season. They would not be 9-2 if their players hadn’t gotten hurt.

This is a team that is in decline. However, if they had had everyone healthy from the opening whistle they are probably between 4-6 and 6-4, and still competing for a wild card spot. Injuries are a significant reason why this team is 2-8.

2) Inability to Replace Shaun Alexander. Julius Jones was supposed to be the back that was going to save Seattle from the pain of having to replace the best running back in franchise history, Shaun Alexander. Julius Jones has not delivered on that four year contract he signed last spring. He has 139 carries for 616 yards with two touchdowns and a 4.4 yards per carry average. He has also added 14 receptions for 66 yards.

I warned people in the preseason that the Seahawks had not found Alexander’s replacement. I warned that he would be lucky to break 1,000 yards rushing. At this pace he will finish with 985 rushing yards. The Seahawks as a team rank 19th in rushing yards and 19th in rushing touchdowns.

That’s just not enough production, especially considering the injuries they have had in the passing game. Seattle needed a running game that could carry them through those injuries. Instead, they have a below average ground game that isn’t helping them move or score the ball.

3) Not resigning Steve Hutchinson back in 2006. This is the move that...

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