The Seahawks didn’t lose because Sam Darnold threw an interception.
They lost because 341 passing yards and five straight touchdowns were still not enough.
When halftime hit at Lumen Field on Sunday, waves of Seahawks legends paraded onto the turf. They wore nearly identical black letterman jackets, with their renowned last names in bold white type across the shoulders.
HASSELBECK
LYNCH
CHANCELLOR
ALEXANDER
BALDWIN
BENNETT
BLADES
ZORN
WARNER
The depth of standout Seahawks was seemingly endless.
At halftime. Only halftime.
Not when it mattered most.
In a 38-35 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Seahawks’ defense was bludgeoned by Baker Mayfield and their own deteriorating depth.
The Seahawks entered Sunday without a trio of injured contributors — cornerback Devon Witherspoon, safety Julian Love and linebacker DeMarcus Lawrence. Starting cornerback Riq Woolen and linebacker Derick Hall exited during the game as well, breaking an already damaged dam for the Seahawks defense.
On a particularly damning third-and-15, Mayfield found rookie wide receiver (and Steilacoom product) Emeka Egbuka behind backup cornerback Nehemiah Pritchett for a 20-yard touchdown. Egbuka was open again for the two-point conversion, beating backup safety Ty Okada to the corner of the end zone to give Tampa Bay a 21-14 lead.
Pritchett (Woolen’s replacement) and Okada (Love’s replacement) were each identified and exposed.
But this, too, was a comprehensive cratering. Mayfield completed an incomprehensible 29 of 33 passes (87.8%) on Sunday, throwing for 379 yards and two touchdowns. Egbuka eviscerated his hometown team for seven catches (on seven targets) with 163 yards and a touchdown, proving uncoverable regardless of the cornerback.
The Bucs went 7 for 11 on third down and averaged 7.3 yards per play. The Seahawks managed two passes defended and a single sack.
The cause of defeat was defensive incompetence, not the Seahawks’ quarterback.
“It’s the next man up mentality,” said safety Coby Bryant, who led the Seahawks with eight tackles and a tackle for loss. “We can’t use that [injury question] as an excuse. We’ve got to execute. That’s the bottom line.”
Since we’re eliminating excuses? Darnold does need to be better when the game is waiting to be won. In a 35-35 tie with 58 seconds left, he felt pressure and tossed a pass toward wide receiver Cooper Kupp, with Bucs linebacker Lavonte David intercepting it instead. It’s the second time this season that Darnold has lost a turnover with a game on the line, after he fumbled late in the fourth quarter of the season-opening 17-13 loss to San Francisco.
“I felt like I could have changed the protection,” Darnold said of the interception. “If they were bringing [a blitz] to the other side, I had a good answer to that side. I think [wide receiver Tory Horton] was open as well on the right side. So I just have to be a lot better there presnap, and I’ll leave it at that.”
He concluded by calling it “a bad quarterback play.”
(An equally bad quarterback play occurred earlier, when rookie Jalen Milroe replaced Darnold and promptly tossed an option pitch wide of running back Kenneth Walker III, resulting in a lost fumble. The change of pace was unwarranted, considering Darnold was 7 for 8 for 80 yards at the time.)
Other than that, the quarterback play couldn’t have been much better.
Darnold completed 28 of 34 passes for 341 yards and four touchdowns Sunday, bombarding an equally injured Bucs defense. That included a dart between defenders to wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba for the Seahawks’ first score; a pair of touchdowns to tight end AJ Barner; moon balls that Smith-Njigba and Dareke Young settled under for 53 and 36 yards, respectively; and a fourth-and-two improvisation where he eluded Bucs linebackers Yaya Diaby and Haason Reddick and hit Horton for a circus 21-yard score.
Sure, Darnold is not above blame.
But the Seahawks are not in position to win without him. He was not the problem.
“Man, Sam’s fantastic,” said Barner, who caught seven passes for 53 yards and two touchdowns. “He’s doing a heck of a job — just how consistent he is, how hard he plays, how he leads. We have a very special quarterback here, and I think people are starting to find that out.”
Added Horton: “He goes out there, puts his heart on the field. We can tell with his game, he’s always on point. He’s sharp. Shoot, he’s a great quarterback. I have nothing bad to say about him, even if I tried to.”
No worries. The wider world will say plenty. They’ll say the previously turnover prone quarterback is back to his old ways, that he’s doomed to self-destruct when the pocket collapses. They’ll say his success is a system-made mirage. They’ll say his success is not sustainable.
They should say that this defense needs to be better. Maybe the returns of Witherspoon, Love, Lawrence, etc., will make a dramatic difference. Maybe Sunday’s tackling issues were temporary. Maybe head coach Mike Macdonald has more tricks up his sleeve. Maybe Seahawks kicker Jason Myers, who missed a 44-yard field goal Sunday and is 9 for 12 on the season, will soon find his form.
Maybe this was a hiccup. Or a hurricane.
But Kam Chancellor, Cliff Avril, Michael Bennett, etc., are not walking back onto that field.
Unless it’s halftime.
At least then, fans had something to celebrate.