Seahawks Run Game Struggles In Shotgun-Heavy Offense
Thursday vs. the 49ers saw the Seahawks offense lean almost exclusively on the shotgun. This was Seattle abandoning their under center formations, once their core approach to running the ball. Why?
Where have the Seahawks’ under center formations gone?
That’s what I’d ask Seattle offensive coordinator Shane Waldron.
In their crucial week 15 game at home to the San Francisco 49ers, the Seahawks put Geno Smith under center just 5 times and in the pistol 0 times. This, as the data shows, was a season-low total by some margin. And Seattle’s usage of non-shotgun looks has been trending down as the 2022 season has progressed.
It’s a basic observation to make, but the Seahawks’ lack of formational diversity and pass-heavy gameplan versus the 49ers really does make little sense.
Tellingly, Seattle’s past season low of under center usage came in week 2 at San Francisco. So Waldron seemingly lacks confidence in his offense’s ability to cope against the width, style, and talent of the 49ers front from under center looks (note that the New York Jets, Seattle’s Week 17 opponent, play similarly). And maybe he just doesn’t have the under center wrinkles to attack this scheme.
“Credit to San Francisco, that’s a heck of front seven that they have right there,” Waldron described last Wednesday. “They did a good job of hitting some of those blocks as they were coming off the ball.”
The early season road trip to Santa Clara, though, was a game in which the Seahawks got down early; whereas week 15 hosting San Francisco was a closer encounter—Seattle’s win percentage only dipped permanently below the “20%” win probability, often used as the cutoff point by data nerds, after Travis Homer’s two-minute drill fumble. And yet Week 15 under center was even more absent.
Instead, the Seahawks offense leaned on shotgun formations and passing. Geno Smith dropped back to pass 45 times compared to just 13 Seattle rush attempts. The impact of this was the Seahawks attack relying heavily on Geno and a struggling, out-matched, exposed pass protection to get it done.
“I think it impacts all of us,” Pete Carroll said the day after Week 15 on whether not sticking with the run game was impacting Geno’s play. “That’s the style we are trying to get to, and we are not there. It affects the whole game to me.”
Run concept-wise, the Seahawks’ 11 total shotgun runs were more stylistic change-ups than their old bread-and-butter of wide zone and midzone—the stuff that can only really work from under center looks anyway. Seattle ran 7 inside zone plays (4 with split-action), 1 pin-pull play, 1 GT-Wrap, 1 same side toss with GT-Wrap influence pulls, and 1 draw play.
“Up front, I thought those guys did a good job of being efficient,” Waldron reflected on Wednesday. “We didn’t necessarily have the huge runs, but through the course of the game, plenty of those four- and five-yard runs can keep you on track on offense.” The offensive coordinator’s on-track messaging reflects that the Seahawks’ Week 15 run game was used more as a variation-of-pace deal for the offense.
For Carroll, the Seahawks moving forward need to try running the ball more often. “We haven’t been able to find the rhythm of it, and we’ve lost at the line of scrimmage at times in games, and probably got knocked off course in the plan, and how we like to go with it,” the head coach said on Friday. “We just need to stay with it more. Shane and I keep talking about it. We have to stay with it and just keep pounding away and the plays will happen. Threes and fours need to be okay because you know you are going to bust something. In particular with Ken [Walker III], the ball is going to break out and you just have to keep pounding until it happens.” It’s a commitment.
The head coach was even more explicit on Tuesday. “It just has not been clean like we wanted to,” he started on the run game. “Those guys [the offensive line] are still working hard and busting their tails, but more than anything, we just need to keep doing it. We just need to keep doing it, taking our swings, and the plays will pop. I just want more frequency.”
So a greater volume of runs. And what about the staple run concepts from the under center formations? Okay, Seattle has a banged-up running back room and Kenneth Walker III’s vision has sometimes suffered from his rookie status or boom-seeking style. Sure, the Seahawks started from under center in week 15 with shaky plays too.
This blown up screen on the first drive of the game went nowhere; Damien Lewis releasing downfield was surprised by the quick read and inside path of the linebacker, missing his block:
Meanwhile, this bootleg concept was killed by pass protection issues from Arik Armstead’s inside move versus the Phil Haynes-Austin Blythe combo and Nick Bosa’s wide win one-on-one with Noah Fant:
But there was under center meat left on the bone by Seattle: their two under center runs against the 49ers went for 5 yards and 15 yards. Both were from heavier personnel.
The first arrived via 13 personnel, 1 running back, 3 tight end:
The second from 12 personnel:
Each of the runs were the same gap concept: duo, power-without-the-puller. This, unlike the shotgun looks, dictated that San Francisco’s defensive line played less aggressively penetrating than usual.
These plays are surely part of what Waldron was alluding to when he admitted: “sticking with some runs in certain situations a little bit more from my end.”
Meanwhile, the one under center play-action drop-back throw—interspersing these two runs—saw Geno connect downfield to Tyler Lockett for 19-yards. The 49ers pressured with a cover 3 fire zone that saw the receiver isolated against a deep third corner in a lot of space. Seattle’s pass protection really struggled again, but the quarterback calmly sidestepped the penetration of the nose tackle before moving up in the pocket.
If, and whew is this an ever-growing qualifying phrase, but if the Seahawks want to start winning games and to make the postseason, they must get back to a more balanced approach on offense. Of course that starts with just running the ball more efficiently, an aspect that saw Waldron identify a moment in time during his Thursday media appearance:
“Not looking back too far, but at the end of the 2021 season, we were able to look on how to finish the season in the run game and talk about that finish and close the circle of our offense of finishing with a good efficient run game and what that means especially when you get into these colder weather games towards the end of the season.”
Seattle also needs to get back to employing the formations that were once a core part of their attack—you know, like during that dominant, late 2021 stretch.
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