Asked about the fact that his team is tied for first place despite a losing record, Seahawks coach Pete Carroll, as he is wont to do having spent the past nine years at USC, reflected back on his days coaching in college football.
“It’s nice to be in first place and all that, but it doesn’t mean anything until you finish,” he said. “It’s kind of like the BCS stuff. You can talk about the BCS and all that stuff that’s up in the air right now; it doesn’t mean anything until the end of it. To me this is exactly the same way of looking at it.”
Except the Seahawks scenario is different in at least one way: if this were college football, Seattle wouldn’t be postseason eligible.
But while a six-win or better record is required to be bowl eligible in college football, the NFL has no such distinctions in its extensive rule book. And the longer this season goes on with the Seattle, St. Louis and San Francisco (yes, we’re writing off Arizona’s chances) failing to assert themselves in what the rest of the country has taken to calling the NFC Worst, the more plausible it becomes that a 7-9 team could actually win the division and host a playoff game.
After a Monday Night Football debacle between a pair of 3-7 teams put the national spotlight on the NFC West, national analysts spent Tuesday debating, among other topics, whether a 7-9 team should be rewarded with a playoff spot.
Welcome to the NFC West, where postseason eligibility is easier to obtain that a berth in the Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl St. Petersburg (No really, that’s a bowl game. You can look it up).
All kidding aside, however, the parity — and that’s the kindest possible way to describe it — in the NFC West means the Seahawks still have everything to play for even after losing four of their past five games, all by double-digit margins.
But even though a playoff berth is very much in reach, the Seahawks insist that isn’t their main focus right now. Yes, a division title is their goal, that’s been the case all season. Yet with so many things going wrong right now, players know their playoff hopes, no matter how weak the division, hinge on turning things around after another blowout loss at home.
“Oh, it’s real normal,” quarterback Matt Hasselbeck said sarcastically when asked about being in first place with a losing record. “Yeah, hey, it’s weird, but right now I don’t think this team is focused on the division. What we need to focus on is just getting better and improving and fixing our errors and figure out who we are and getting an identity in certain areas, whether that be running the ball, or short-yardage, or third down, or whatever those things are, and just try to get better. Just try to keep improving because focusing on that big goal at the end, there’s a lot of stuff we need to do first to get that done.”
As Hasselbeck points out, the offense has plenty of issues which were only further exposed with receiver Mike Williams out with a foot injury. Things on defense are equally concerning, particularly considering that the defense looked like a strength of the team early in the season.
What was once a stout run defense has become porous.The pass defense continues to struggle, particularly since the pass rush has gone missing of late — the Seahawk have gone back-to-back games without a sack for the first time this season.
“We’re trying to get our football right,” Carroll said. “We’re not talking about where we are — first place, or second place, or any of that kind of stuff, or what anybody else is doing — we’re trying to get our ball right. It happens that we’re still in this race.”
So yes, the Seahawks have issues, plenty of them. But they also can hang onto the fact that, with even a descent finish to the season, they could be playoff bound. It’s the unique reality of the NFC West — the Seahawks, despite all of their recent struggles, are very much alive and well in the division race.
“It doesn’t matter what’s happened in the past, all that matters is what you do in the present and in the future,” Hasselbeck said. “So hopefully, we kind of put a stake in the ground and use this as, ‘Ok, let’s start now. Let’s finish strong, starting now, and improve from where we are right now.’”
Herald Writer John Boyle: jboyle@heraldnet.com. For more Seahawks coverage, check out the Seahawks blog at heraldnet.com/seahawksblog
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