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25 Plays11 months ago
Miles talks about the clutch drive of the year, the importance of playing Ernest, and the NFL's longest-tenured owner.
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Transcript
Introduction and Host Updates
00:00:01
Tristan Amundson
Folks, welcome in to the world's only Seahawks podcast. This is Miles. If you are a regular listener to the show, you know that these precious opening moments has been my co-host, Tristan, uses his platform to educate and inspire. ah Tristan is not here today, and you can rest assured that this is not a hostile takeover of the podcast and that this is not a regular plan going forward. This is just how our schedules work out this week. um Kind of how it will go before we inevitably sign our multimillion dollar deal with a large podcasting corporation. There's a lot of competition right now to figure out exactly who that is.
00:00:55
Tristan Amundson
ah But until we sign that deal, we are but two men with ah other things on the schedule other than football. And this is just how it went ah this week. And I can tell you that Tristan and I are both very amused at our incredible attendance record so far with the podcast. But today,
00:01:16
Tristan Amundson
It is just
Seahawks vs 49ers Game Recap
00:01:17
Tristan Amundson
me. And let me tell you, Tristan is disappointed that he can't be here because we are talking about a Seahawks victory, a 20 to 17 win over the San Francisco 49ers in San Francisco. This was not a beautiful win. Most of the game, the Niners definitely controlled it. ah If not on the scoreboard, then definitely in the run of play and that got me taking a lot of time thinking about really big picture changes. We knew coming into this game, the Seahawks really needed this one in order to avoid a December where we were looking at college prospects, top 10 picks in the draft, things like that. The Seahawks really needed this one and it looked for a long time. Like it looked for about 50 of the 60 minutes that they were not the better team on the day.
00:02:15
Tristan Amundson
So I spent a lot of time thinking about big picture changes that would be needed. And folks, you might be hearing my thoughts on those big picture changes in the next few weeks. Even with this win, the Seahawks are not out of the woods yet. Definitely not likely to get a playoff spot this year, but For now, there's a lot to be proud of. The team really thought it it took a big fight for all 60 minutes to get the job done. And they got it done. Specifically, in the last four minutes of the game, both the defensive and the offensive units really closed strong. And especially the defense the last defensive possession, um leaving aside the last 12 seconds where San Francisco was madly trying to lateral the ball. but
00:03:06
Tristan Amundson
the last true defensive possession because this game was such a kind of swampy mess back and forth that could kind of get lost in the sauce a little bit. But here's how the last few possessions of the game went. So there's about four minutes left in the game and San Francisco has their largest lead of the game, which believe it or not was only four points. It was 17 to 13 with four minutes left. And this was the sequence where on a third down run,
00:03:33
Tristan Amundson
Gino gets stuffed. It looks like it could be a first down. He could have not gotten it. I think there was a lot of confusion on the sideline. At this point, the broadcast did cut to Mike McDonald. And it looked like he was trying to communicate with the referees about getting a chain measurement out there on the field. It was definitely a close enough play. And at a crucial part in the game, I really thought they were going to bring out the chains to measure it. And I was really surprised that they didn't.
00:04:04
Tristan Amundson
You see the play clock winding down, it's getting down under 20 and there's just kind of some general confusion. And I really thought they could have, they should have called a timeout at that point in time. Now it turned out they really needed all three of their timeouts and Who's to say how this game would have worked out if they did call a timeout at that point, but they didn't call a timeout. There's kind of this disorganized rush as they get to the line of scrimmage. The play call is a run to Zach Charbonnet. Under normal so circumstances, i I like that play call. Charbonnet has a really good conversion percentage in those short yardage situations. He does have a higher percentage in those situations than Kenneth Walker. and
00:04:49
Tristan Amundson
But there's something the whole thing felt a little discombobulated, and I felt it would have been worthwhile for the team to call a timeout, get everything together, and then really execute the fourth down play that they wanted to. Anyway, it didn't happen, and I ended up needing the timeout later. So what happens is San Francisco gets the ball on their own 37-yard line with four minutes left. So that's really not that far from field goal range. The the team needs about a 20-ish a 25 to 30-ish yard drive to be in solid field goal range, maybe less than that if they had one of the Brandon Aubries of the world on their team. They don't need to go that far in order to get in field goal range, and they don't need that many first downs in order to really run the clock down ah so that the Seahawks just don't have time left.
00:05:43
Tristan Amundson
What happens is they end up gaining 21 yards on that drive, getting to the Seattle 42 yard line. um And a ah really hidden play here was that that didn't stand out to me until I watched the replay was the Niners have about a third and 11 and they they pass it to their main guy who was devastating throughout the entire game, Juwan Jennings.
00:06:07
Tristan Amundson
And Kobe Bryant makes a really important open field tackle. It's not a beautiful tackle. He does not bring Jennings down the first time he contacts him, but he sticks with the play. He's given up a lot of size to Jennings. Um, you really saw what he focused on the place, giving up a lot of size. Doesn't bring him down on the first kind of touch, but he does bring him down after only about five yards gained with 11 yards to go. And that leads to.
00:06:36
Tristan Amundson
A 49ers punt, that's a touch back. And we are looking at two minutes, 38 seconds on the clock, 80 yards to go.
Key Players and Performances
00:06:45
Tristan Amundson
You need a touchdown. The team is only down to one timeout. There's that crucial timeout again.
00:06:52
Tristan Amundson
And as we know, the offense just gets the job done. It was a phenomenal drive by Geno Smith. We see that this team is really phenomenal in the two minute drill, either at the end of the first half where they have actually had phenomenal success or here at the end of the second half when it all really matters. It's a pretty big contrast to, I was really astonished to see that the Fox broadcast had a really interesting statistical nugget that the team has not scored an opening a a touchdown on their opening drive in like 13 or 14 games. So that's going back well into the end of Pete's year in 2023. I don't think that's an accident. I think in the opening drive teams are looking, the defense is looking for a combination of run and pass. And that's a science, a chemistry that the Seahawks have clearly struggled with this year. In those two minute drives, you know, you're passing the ball. The defense knows you're passing the ball. The offense knows you're passing the ball and it kind of
00:07:53
Tristan Amundson
uh, maybe simplifies like your decision tree a little bit. And we see that Gino is absolutely phenomenal in those situations. Most of the last yards of the drive, including the the touchdown run, Gino gets with his legs, but 38 of those 80 yards that the team needed on the last drive go to Jackson Smith and Jigba, who was the leading receiver on the day, even though DK Metcalf was healthy. And a lot of those 38 yards in the last two minutes that that's phenomenal.
00:08:25
Tristan Amundson
It didn't feel like it throughout most of the day, but looking back in retrospect, this is the defensive performance that we were really waiting for since January, when Mike McDonald was hired, the incredible resume and the numbers from the Ravens. It maybe doesn't feel like it because when you when you think about an outstanding defensive performance, you want to be winning the game like, you know, 30 to 10 or 24 to seven or something like that. but Given the quality of the opponent and their resume, I really do think that this was an absolutely outstanding defensive effort, their best of the year. um And something that you can be really, really be proud of ah looking forward because the team has made a lot of adjustments to their defense.
00:09:10
Tristan Amundson
more adjustments than you'd want to be making to key rotational players as the year has gone on. um And I think we're seeing that that the that the team has, even if they didn't really make the most optimal decisions in the offseason, whether in March or in August, that They are on the process of finding the the players and the skill sets they need to to make the whole thing work together. So even though San Francisco is clearly struggling on the year at five and five after making the Super Bowl last year, this team is still eighth in the league in points per game. And despite all those losses on the year, this was only the third time in the season that the San Francisco offense had been held under 20 points.
00:09:54
Tristan Amundson
in the game and the other two teams to do that were two of the best defenses in the league with really established defensive credentials, the Minnesota Vikings and the Kansas City Chiefs. So big ups to the Seahawks defense for joining the Vikings and the Chiefs as the only two, the only three teams to limit the San Francisco offense to under 20 points that that offense has still been a machine, even even if the team is five and five.
00:10:19
Tristan Amundson
As the game went on, I think you could really see that the game plan for the Seattle defense was keep everything in front of them. The longest play they allowed on the day was 22 yards. Shanahan creates explosive plays. i'll that's That's his bread and butter. He does it all the time. That's a phenomenal accomplishment.
00:10:40
Tristan Amundson
Also Brock Purdy on the day held to 159 yards passing and maybe didn't it feel like it because the Seahawks did allow a high completion percentage. I think that was actually part of the strategy of keeping everything in front of them, allowing him to complete a short pass as as long as it's short. He was 21 for 28 on the day, but 159 yards is not very much.
00:11:03
Tristan Amundson
So Brock Purdy has started 35 regular season games. That is his second lowest total for for yardage in a game. So that's that's really phenomenal. Also Christian McCaffrey, I know that on the Niners side, there's probably concerns that he's not fully healthy, but he's still Christian McCaffrey.
00:11:23
Tristan Amundson
He goes 19 rushes for 79 yards on the bay. I did notice that he gained 11 yards on a pretty pointless draw to draw play to end the first half. I'm not very interested in counting that one. So I'm actually going to adjust his line to 18 carries for 68 yards. That measures out to 3.7 yards per carry. That's pretty phenomenal run defense now for the second week in a row. I know Brock Purdy did get Uh, he, he, he did cause some problems with his legs, but, um, I don't know. I don't know if that whether to count that ah as run defense or not on those kinds of scramble plays. And I think we saw Ernest Jones really made a big difference. A lot of his tackles were on very short, um, very short runs. He, he was excellent at.
00:12:15
Tristan Amundson
being patient behind the line and striking when he needed to and really getting in there and and making a lot of ah very short, sure ah causing those runs to be really short, tackling very strong. This guy's only been in Seattle for a couple of weeks. he He may or may not know where the grocery store is. And it was such a phenomenal performance. I was i really confused about how has this guy been traded twice since August? He's been traded twice in the last few months the Rams traded into Tennessee in August and then Tennessee traded into Seattle ah just a few weeks ago I'm really not I'm thankful that he's ended up in Seattle for sure because it's definitely changing the whole feel of the defense I'm
00:13:01
Tristan Amundson
really not sure, especially with the Rams, I'm really not sure ah what was going on there that allowed him to kind of jar loose and credit to John Schneider in the front office for figuring out the need, identifying where that skill set was in the league and bringing him into the team because it it really feels like a foundational piece. ah Yeah, it feels like a huge foundational piece.
00:13:27
Tristan Amundson
The last few weeks I've been monitoring Draymont Jones, noting that he the last two games only played about 30% of the snaps. ah seeing and I was wondering if the team was really trying to keep him off of the field for run situations. It's kind of interesting this week. He was back up to about 50% of the snaps.
00:13:47
Tristan Amundson
but those were overwhelmingly passing situations. So he was on the field for 30 snaps total, 22 of those were passing snaps, and only eight of them were rushing plays. So i i do think there is I do think that the Seahawks are very closely monitoring his usage. And on those 22 passing plays, he got two pressures, including the one really nice sack. So I think that Seahawks are helping themselves by um making sure that Draymont Jones is in a more specialized usage. Also, last game out, another thing we noticed was Jackson Smith and Jigba, the amount of air yards, the the the distance the ball is traveling across the field before it gets to him ah really increased in a way that we hadn't seen before in his short career. So before before the Rams game,
00:14:43
Tristan Amundson
76 was his career high in terms of air yards uh with the ball how far the ball was being thrown to him 76 in the ram's game it went up to 131 when he had a monster game and this week it was 82 so he would have broken his career high in consecutive weeks And just to show how dramatic of a difference that is from how he has normally been used, especially in his rookie year.
Team Changes and Strategy
00:15:09
Tristan Amundson
So Jackson Smith and Jigba, he has 27 career games played.
00:15:14
Tristan Amundson
And in six of those games, he actually has negative air yards before the ball gets to him. So that's, you know, that would be a screen, you know, the ball comes straight parallel to the line of scrimmage, uh, when the receiver's behind the line of scrimmage. So yeah, in six, six, that's a huge percentage, six of 27 career games, the, the air yards were actually negative. So.
00:15:38
Tristan Amundson
I'm not sure if the team quite realized what they had with Jackson Smith and Jig, but that they that they had a huge downfield threat. Maybe it's ah a story of development and he couldn't have done that in 2023, but boy, has that really changed the the whole picture of of the already strong wide receiver group. I wanted to give a shout out to Jake Myers. but i i I felt that he was the hidden hero of this game and I i felt that way as it was happening In the first half, easy to forget about these plays, but he nails two field goals, one from 52 yards, one from 57 yards. The offense did not help him get very close. Those were both no doubt makes, uh, and yeah yeah, that's, that's, that's asking a lot of your field goal kicker 52 and 57 yards. Those are not givens. It would not have been his fault if one, uh,
00:16:37
Tristan Amundson
ah If one of those had been missed, you'd hope you'd make at least one, but absolutely nailing both of those was really crucial because clearly the Seahawks needed every point in this game.
00:16:48
Tristan Amundson
We saw the 2024 return of Abe Lucas at right tackle. And it was clear that the team had a strategy to rotate every so often at right tackle between Abe Lucas and Mike Jarrell. Lucas got 70% of the snaps. Jarrell got 30% of the snaps.
00:17:09
Tristan Amundson
Interestingly, I'm not sure when this stopped, but we did see Anthony Bradford get 100% of the snaps at right guard instead of doing the the similar drive-by-drive rotation thing with Christian Haynes. I ah i've just never noticed this before. I don't remember a team ever really doing this, having an intentional plan to get different units of the five men out there on the field within the same game. Still not sure how I feel about it, but um I guess it worked out today. and i ah also so It's been easy to forget that ah Jason Peters is in the building. He's been in the building for quite a while now and we still haven't seen him out on the field. um I guess I'm curious what the plan is there and and what's going on. and
00:17:57
Tristan Amundson
But then again, um you know does that mean that the team is planning to rotate seven linemen into the game ah drive by drive? um We'll see. you definitely You definitely want a different approach to the offensive line position for 2025. I think we can all agree about that.
00:18:19
Tristan Amundson
Speaking of the offensive line, it did feel the Seahawks were already coming in to San Francisco ah facing an uphill battle. That's what happens when you come and face Kyle Shanahan. And that hill felt even steeper on Friday when we got the news that starting center Connor Williams was all of a sudden retiring. And at first this was very disappointing and confusing to hear about the timing felt kind of bizarre.
00:18:47
Tristan Amundson
But the more I thought about it, the more I really appreciated the Seahawks and John Schneider and Mike McDonald for handling this unexpected development in a really classy way. All we know in the public is that Connor Williams decided to do this for personal reasons. And honestly, that's all we need to know. um It has to be, yeah, yeah, this doesn't just happen on accident or kind of a willy-nilly decision. And I really appreciate that the Seahawks um kept it. I just felt like it was a very classy response just saying, hey, this this is happening for personal reasons. That's all you and the public need to know. That's probably all we'll ever know.
00:19:35
Tristan Amundson
um And it did make me remember that that Connor Williams tore his ACL as a member of the Miami Dolphins on December 11th of last year. I don't know if I'm like 10, 15 years behind in the the world of medicine, but I'm still in this mindset where an ACL tear is a 12 month injury. And that was only 11 months ago.
00:19:59
Tristan Amundson
So it is pretty incredible still, I think we've mentioned this before, but it still is incredible that Connor Williams got back in playing shape from a torn ACL in about eight months. And that's that's a ah really tough guy. That's a really tough guy. That's that's an that's a feat. that's ah That's a very unheralded accomplishment to get back from an ACL tear in just eight months and um be able to play a full NFL schedule. I think he'd done 100% of the snaps since the start of the year. so
00:20:33
Tristan Amundson
It had to be something very meaningful ah for him to to make this decision. And, um you know, definitely wish it it didn't happen, but but wishing Connor Williams all the best as he moves on into the the next chapter of his life. All right. So moving on to other NFL topics.
Women in NFL Ownership
00:20:58
Tristan Amundson
as I do, I was listening to my favorite league-wide NFL podcast, Pushing the Pile with Mike Renner and Kyle Long, the former guard for the Chicago Bears. And they mentioned something that I, as a ah so pretty dedicated NFL watcher, I just had no idea about. And that is,
00:21:24
Tristan Amundson
The owner of the Chicago Bears is a 101-year-old woman. Her name is Virginia McCasky. Her full name is Virginia McCasky Hallis, the daughter of George Hallis, the famed longtime Chicago Bears coach. And this got me This got me in in my classic tizzy of research. And what I found was a 60-70 minute documentary that NFL Films put out a few years ago called, A Lifetime of Sundays. Not many people got their eyes on this.
00:22:00
Tristan Amundson
But let me tell you, I really, really appreciated it. So a Lifetime of Sundays, it is a profile of four women who, ah this documentary is about five years old. So it's a profile of four women who have had ownership who had ownership positions with NFL teams at that time and had been involved in the league for pretty much their entire life. so ah We had Patricia Rooney, who's a member of the the Rooney family who has owned the Pittsburgh Steelers since their start. Unfortunately, Patricia passed away between the release of the documentary until now, but it was very clear that Patricia Rooney was all about the city of Pittsburgh. So that included the Steelers, but she was really a Pittsburgher. And what's cool about that is like,
00:22:53
Tristan Amundson
In a lot of professional sports these days, ah the athletes and the coaches tend to live in ah a suburb or a bedroom community outside of the city. But she was completely in it. The Rooney family was always in the city of Pittsburgh. And um yeah, she just had a phenomenal role with that team and you know part of all all six Super Bowl winning franchises. Another of the women who also unfortunately passed away since the release of this documentary was Norma Hunt.
00:23:23
Tristan Amundson
who was the widow of Lamar Hunt, who was the longtime owner of the Kansas City Chiefs. And at the time she passed away, what was amazing about Norma Hunt was she never missed a Super Bowl.
00:23:37
Tristan Amundson
And there's at this point, there are only ah there's only four known people who have never missed a Super Bowl. Three of them are fans. One of them is a photographer. Maybe there's somebody else out there that we've just missed, but. um Yeah, that's a lot of dedication to get to the Super Bowl every single year. I mean, think about it. Starting from Super Bowl I, you know, way back in the day that wasn't very well attended and seeing it become the incredible ah the American holiday that it's become. And Lamar Hunt actually was the the guy who came up with the name Super Bowl. So pretty incredible to be that close to the history. but
00:24:19
Tristan Amundson
So both Norma Hunt and Patricia Rooney were never majority owners of teams. But now we get to the two women who still today have majority ownership of football teams. And I was really inspired by both of them. So the first one, Martha Firestone Ford of the Detroit Lions. So Martha was born into the Firestone family of like Firestone tires.
00:24:48
Tristan Amundson
And way back in the day in the 50s or the 60s, she marries William Clay Ford, who's the grandson of Henry Ford. So we're talking some really entrenched Michigan, you know, automobile royalty. ah William purchases the Detroit Lions in 1964, and he runs the team until he passes away ah before the start of the 2014 season. So in that time,
00:25:17
Tristan Amundson
The Lions had 14 winning years. um And when he passed away, Martha decided to step in in 2014. At that time, she was 89 years old, decides to step in and be the majority owner, not to sell that team. In the years since, she has had six winning years against five losing seasons, a really complete turnaround for the Detroit Lions. And of course the team's nine and one right now, absolutely cruising.
00:25:47
Tristan Amundson
And look, ah we we know the Seahawks probably are not going to be in the Super Bowl picture. I'm rooting for the Detroit Lions for this reason. I really want to see Martha Firestone Ford, who is now in her late 90s. I want her to be the Super Bowl champion. I just really want to see it. Obviously the team Uh, the teams are just a lot of fun to root for a very inspiring team, a very mentally tough team. And I just love that Martha Firestone Ford is at the top of the food chain there. It's, it's, it's awesome. But that does leave us with Virginia McCasky Hallis, who has a very unique seat, a very unique view across the history of the entirety of professional football.
00:26:36
Tristan Amundson
So George Halas, he wasn't just the owner or the coach of the Chicago Bears for a long time, but George Halas was there in 1920 in Canton, Ohio, ah which is why the Pro Football Hall fame is in Canton.
00:26:52
Tristan Amundson
the meeting where the league that would become the NFL is established and the first owners ah kind of start their teams. And what's what's really crazy is this is not inflation adjusted, but we can imagine to start the Chicago Bears ah who were known as the Decatur Stalies for their first year, to start the Chicago Bears, George Halas has to pay $100.
00:27:19
Tristan Amundson
dollars That's what it took, $100. And again, he's only 25 years old since the year 1920. That's a big reason how Alice was able to coach the Bears for decades and decades. He got this thing started when he was only 25.
00:27:35
Tristan Amundson
So we get to Virginia attending her very first NFL game. And that happened back in 1932 when she was still a young child in elementary school. So she, Virginia has been going to Bears games since 1932. So that is just so far before, you know, the start of the first Super Bowl, the start of helmets with face masks, the start of, you know,
00:28:04
Tristan Amundson
Lombardi, Vince Lombardi came around several decades into her football but involvement, you know. um So when George Halas passed away in the 80s, she takes over the team in 1983 at age 60. And she has run the team ever since. And she's currently the longest tenured owner in the NFL. So We know that the bears are not in the Super Bowl picture this year, but I really love this story. i I really love the fact that the ownership started when you did not have to be a billionaire to enter NFL ownership.
00:28:46
Tristan Amundson
And even ah the the Ford family in the sixties, you did have to be a multimillionaire to enter the league at that time that William Ford purchased the lions for $6 million, dollars which is a lot of money. So I just love, it would just would be so crazy to see that, um, you know, the NFL is starting as this type of like passion project and it grows and grows to the point where you got to be a pretty wealthy guy to be an owner.
00:29:15
Tristan Amundson
grows and grows to the point where you gotta be a multi-millionaire to be an owner. And then at this point, you have to be one of the very few people in the world who's a billionaire to be an owner. It would just be so wild to see just everything, the entire history of the game.
00:29:31
Tristan Amundson
um So wishing Virginia McCasky and the Bears all the best, and also Martha Firestone Ford and the Lions. I can't believe I didn't know about these things. um So anyway, check it out, A Lifetime of Sundays, really really great documentary. And yeah, I love it. All right.
Upcoming Games Preview
00:29:54
Tristan Amundson
In week 12, the Seahawks will be hosting the Arizona Cardinals. As I mentioned earlier, the Seahawks are not out of the woods yet. I think we're going to say this before every single week for the rest of the year, which is why the Seahawks have such a low percentage chance of making the playoffs. But the team absolutely needs this one, um especially these divisional games. We're going to go to the sequence right now where we're seeing the Cardinals, then the Jets, and then the Cardinals again. Winning those two games really puts the Seahawks in the driver's seat in the division. But it it is unlikely they're going to. It's unlikely they'll win both games, but you can also see them doing it.
00:30:36
Tristan Amundson
I think the Cardinals are sneaking up on people this year because they did get off to a two and four start, which is pretty rough. um But very quietly, they have gone on a four game winning streak since then. They blew out the Bears, they blew out the Jets, and then they've had a bye week. So they're coming in as a very rested team. I did notice that Kyler Murray is two and six for his career against the Seahawks with the last win coming back way in twenty way back in 2020. Obviously that doesn't have a huge bearing on what's gonna happen this Sunday, but um there is that. Hopefully that's a source of comfort somehow.
00:31:18
Tristan Amundson
um So I do actually do have a note that Tristan gave me before he was unable to make the podcast today. Let me see if I can... ah Tristan says, go Hawks.