How WR Jake Bobo Made The 2023 Seahawks Roster
25-year-old rookie? 4.99s 40? UDFA? Throughout Seattle's offseason WR Jake Bobo answered these questions. In an all-time competition story, Bobo's now an important part of the Seahawks' 2023 offense:
Jake Bobo would not be cut.
In college, Bobo transferred to UCLA from Duke after catching just three touchdowns for the Blue Devils over four seasons. At a wet, South California pro day, the wide receiver ran a 40-yard-dash timed as slow as 4.99 seconds by some scouts. He turned 25-years-old this past August, making him just 7 months younger than DK Metcalf.
There were valid and multiple reasons to doubt this was happening.
Bobo finished with 7 catches for 76 yards and 1 touchdown in Seattle’s August 4th mock game. The receiver then hauled in all three targets in his first preseason opportunity, putting up 55 receiving yards, including a long of 29 for a touchdown. He drew a taunting penalty. The wideout also made an impressive special teams play.
Still, the cautious whispers. Remember Kasen Williams?
The performances kept coming. Bobo caught 2 passes for 43 yards in preseason game 2 versus the Dallas Cowboys. His craft as a blocker in the run game earned “look-this-play-up” praise from Carroll.
Best be prudent, though. Remember Jazz Ferguson?
Then came the completion of the Bobo trilogy, where the receiver featured in the “first string” of preseason game 3. He caught 2 passes for 27 yards and a touchdown, also drawing a pass interference penalty on another target. Tellingly, he left the game healthy, roster spot secured after just 19 offensive snaps.
Jake Bobo would not be cut.
Bobo’s total stat line over three preseason games: 7 catches for 125 yards and 2 touchdowns. The 6-foot-4 WR proved himself to be more than a possession, jump ball, vibey preseason, whatever happened to that guy?, story. Bobo competed in pretty much every way possible, offense and special teams. He won.
Bobo said after Green Bay that he was “absolutely” nervous about cutdowns and that he’d “had that day circled on my calendar for a while.” Instead of having his NFL dream ended, Bobo has earned a spot on the 2023 Seattle Seahawks 53-man roster.
Bobo doing this as an undrafted free agent is already an embodiment of Seattle’s’ “Always Compete” program mantra. It is the grit, passion, toughness, chip-on-the-shoulder mentality that Pete Carroll and John Schneider crave. And Bobo is just getting started.
Given ongoing injuries to first-round pick Jaxon Smith-Njigba, sophomore Dareke Young, and fifth-year vet Cody Thompson, Bobo is currently Seattle’s projected number 3 receiver behind DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett. Week 1 of real football represents further opportunities for Bobo.
“He has done everything he has had a chance to do,” Carroll summarized following the final preseason game at Lambeau Field.
“He has blocked well. He has played with terrific effort. He is a smart kid. He has made big plays. He has made routine plays. He just comes through with whatever we ask him to do. I am thrilled for him that he had another chance in this game. Drew [Lock] gives him a great pass and a great call. The whole thing was just a gorgeous football play and he figured out how to finish it just right. He has been terrific.”
Green Bay Touchdown
The touchdown raised by the Seahawks’ head coach is worth looking at, as is the play right before Bobo scored.
On the shotgun run, counter blocking play, Bobo was put in a reduced split. From there, he was faced with a press corner in outside leverage. He executed a quick come-to-balance, shimmy move at the line of scrimmage, getting clean from the corner while occupying this defender’s attention, before releasing inside to block and seal the fitting safety away from the designed run direction.
Now compare that previous play to the touchdown catch. Once more, Bobo was in a tighter alignment and matched-up with the same, press coverage, outside leverage corner—Innis Gaines (a 2021 undrafted free agent of the Packers and likely practice squad candidate).
This time Bobo stepped back with his left foot in a similar come-to-balance, shimmy release. Gaines, in press man coverage, first stepped and dropped his weight to the outside, meaning he could only place one grasping hand on Bobo.
Bobo then had the quick spatial recognition to dip flat, underneath the safety traffic inside. Gaines, thinking this looked mighty similar to the run action he saw on the previous play, got caught with his eyes in the backfield.
To prevent the corner from getting back in-phase, Bobo pressed his route vertical to stack the trailing Gaines. He then curved slightly to complete his crossing route, before catching the touchdown pass in clean air with very late hands, ensuring no late recovery for the corner either.
For Drew Lock, this was a well-placed touchdown toss but a very easy read from a quarterbacking perspective. After a yo-yo/return motion gave Lock a pre-snap man coverage indicator, Lock saw the post safety take the first deep crossing route, ran by Matt Landers. From there, it was as simple as Lock progressing to Bobo, his second deep crosser, and seeing wide open separation from one-on-one coverage.
“I mean with Bobo, he just understands, you know, himself,” Geno Smith explained of Bobo’s ability to get open, speaking on cutdown day.
“He understands what he’s working with. He knows how to set guys up and how to get open. You know that’s just something that he’s, I’m pretty sure he’s had that speed his entire life but that hasn’t stopped him from being a great playmaker. And so we don’t look at, you know, all the numbers when it comes to that. If a guy’s getting open and making plays, then that’s his job. So he’s been showing us that he’s a really good receiver and we gotta continue to help him get better.”
Minnesota Touchdown
Bobo’s touchdown against the Vikings showed more of those smarts and knowledge of how to separate with his skillset. Again, the receiver benefitted from his savvy set-ups in his press coverage release plans.
Once more, the prior play was the key to success. On the 2nd and 8, the receiver got a hitch route that, against the press man coverage Minnesota was in, does not get thrown in the “Hoss Y-Juke”-esque pass concept the Seahawks had called in.
Bobo, though, did not waste his rep. He executed a walk-it-out release, like a basketball player driving with the ball before sitting down again, keeping the hips square and varying his tempo. The corner—2022 second-round pick Andrew Booth Jr.—responded with a shuffle-shuffle to maintain outside leverage, with a slight opening of the gate at the top of the route. Bobo gathered the intelligence.
With Lock unable to complete the 2nd down, Seattle was in a clear passing down, 3rd and 8. Bobo was versus press man coverage again from Booth. On this occasion, the receiver was tasked with running the outside vertical route of a four-verts passing concept. That was not easy, given the corner’s primary focus was to stop this exact pattern. Yet Bobo knew he could get Booth to move, the main objective for any receiver when defeating press coverage.
Using a similar basketball-y style, Bobo released to the inside to get the outside leverage Booth. shuffling inside. Bobo’s brutal crossover had Booth opening the gate to the inside as the receiver broke to the outside and the space he had created for his fade route.
Booth, opened the wrong way with no vision on Bobo, was forced to speed-turn as a last-gasp desperation measure. It didn’t save him. Bobo’s line of scrimmage maneuver was quick enough for the ball to come out in time—ahead of pass rush or coverage arrival—and the receiver bundled into the endzone.
“He’s a good player,” Carroll responded to post-Minnesota game questions of how Bobo gets open. “He just continues to find ways. Really creative and athletic. Look at the great play he made on the punt. That was a perfect play there. He's doing good stuff.”
Minnesota Punt Play
That punt play was perfect. (Well, if teammate Jonathan Sutherland could have caught the ball without entering the endzone)
Bobo, at the right, short-side gunner spot, leaned on his guile, persistence and playmaking. He defeated the dropping technique the blocker played with, then determinedly got through another man and turned into a volleyballer, batting the bouncing football away from the endzone.
“What can’t Bobo do?” Enthused Carroll August 17th, the midweek following the Minnesota game.
“He’s looking for his spots in special teams. He’s competing in all of them. He’s not going to be on the field goal block team. I say that but, you never know. He’s really an exciting football player. We don’t know yet, we’ve played one game. We need much more stuff.”
Seattle, of course, got plenty more “stuff.”
Dallas Run Block
For instance: it’s worth pointing out that Bobo made plenty of solid lock-out, physical run blocks in the preseason—always highly valued in Seattle. The Dallas game brought a more special, unique type of run game play from the receiver, which Pete Carroll made a point of identifying.
“If you want to look up something really cool, look at Zach’s [Charbonnet] long run in the first quarter, watch Jake, watch what Jake accomplished on that play,” Carroll said the Tuesday after preseason fixture 2.
“He took care of two guys, fooled one guy and blocked him, and blocked another guy. It was a terrific play, really subtle stuff.”
Bobo released to the outside, understanding the cornerback’s technique and widening this defender away from the run play. He incorporated an early head fake into his stem as he broke vertical, designed to occupy the corner’s attention and sell the deep route.
With the corner transitioning to stay on top of what he thought was a fade route, eyes away from the line of scrimmage, Bobo looked back—as though he was looking back for the pass—but instead was locating the direction of Charbonnet carrying the football.
After walking the corner to the sideline, Bobo executed a well-timed “get off me” swipe at the back of the corner, moving him off the field away from the play, and quickly transitioned to the next threat to Charbonnet. From there, Bobo placed a well-aimed shoulder at the safety.
If the running back had managed to keep his feet in bounds, he was taking this run to the house—but only because of Bobo’s downfield sideline clean-up. This was more intelligence combined with play-making.
Dallas Sluggo
What was nice about Bobo’s preseason football is that, though most of his ball came playing with Drew Lock, the wideout was able to connect with starting quarterback Geno Smith. This “sluggo”, slant-go route was, of course, great in how it got the off coverage cornerback breaking downhill, with Bobo getting free down the sideline for the 26-yard gain.
It’s the pre-snap footage that features the most promising signs for the future, though. After Smith’s cadence got the Cowboys to tip their pressure, the quarterback changed the pass protection and also signaled in a new play to his receivers. Bobo was dialed in.
Geno navigated his way around the pocket well, buying time to wait, with a slight shoulder pump, for Bobo’s double move to play out. Bobo utilized excellent route running violence when snapping the slant part of his route down to sell it to corner DaRon Bland, a 2022 fifth-round pick. And then Geno connected. This was quarterback-receiver chemistry from the ball being spotted to the chains being moved for the first down and more.
Wide Receiver No.?
“I was so excited for Jake,” Geno said August 29th on Bobo making the roster.
“You know, just seeing, I mean thinking about back in OTAs and minicamp, when he was making all those plays, and everyone was like ‘Okay, what is he gonna do, you know when we put the pads on?’ And you know, everything we’ve seen from Bobo is, you know, what he is man. He’s been making plays. He gets separation. He gets open. He catches the ball. And he’s just been a great player for us. And so I’m excited for him, I know it’s a big moment for him and, uh, looking forward to him, you know, growing and getting better.”
Carroll agreed with his quarterback on Bobo’s impressive offseason.
“Jake's flying pretty high right now, he’s done great,” Carroll said a week earlier to Geno, speaking 22nd August.
“He hasn’t just done well in the few plays in the game. He’s done well in practice throughout. He’s been really steady like it’s not a surprise to see him play like that in the games. We were thrilled to see what would happen you know, ‘cause he’s been making plays out here. He looks like he’s part of the flow to me. I don’t see any reason why we would think different. He’s consistent, he’s tough, he’s really, really smart and savvy. He’s been a real factor, and he’s gotten behind people too, in both games. I feel so fortunate that we got him outside of the draft. So we will see how far he can take it but he’s in the middle of everything right now.”
Fast-forward to the present, and Bobo is now in the middle of a regular season receiver group. His role will still be influenced by these surrounding wideouts. DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett are the clear leading duo. JSN is expected to return in relatively quick time, and returned to light practice on August 29th.
Then things get interesting. It sounds like Dareke Young’s hernia requires surgery. That makes 27-year-old Cody Thompson, who missed games 2 and 3 of the preseason after injuring his shoulder in week 1—“banged his shoulder” per Carroll—Bobo’s direct rival. Bobo’s skillset, along with his availability and more recent body of work, makes him a strong candidate for that wide receiver 4 roles.
“He’s just a special football player,” Carroll summarized on Bobo. “Hope we can fit him in.”
Now the Seahawks have fit Bobo into their active roster, a realistic comparison for Bobo’s potential usage in Seattle’s offense is Josh Reynolds’ time with the Rams. The 6-foot-3 Reynolds was drafted in the fourth round of the 2017 draft. After 104 receiving yards in his first year, Reynolds put up receiving yardage totals of 402, 326, and 618 in the remaining three seasons of his rookie deal.
Indeed, Bobo was given preseason work as the off-line-of-scrimmage and motion receiver in Shane Waldron’s offense. He needed to show that versatility given DK Metcalf commanding the vast majority of the “X”, on-the-line reps. With the talent and skillsets of Lockett and Smith-Njigba, Bobo has to fit in where the others aren’t.
Based on his remarkable preseason, it would be silly to rule anything Bobo-related out.
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