Field Gulls
It’s amazing what a road win can do to flip the vibes. After a gut wrenching loss at home to the 49ers, a desperate Seattle Seahawks team came into hostile territory in Pittsburgh and came out with a huge 31-17 victory over the Steelers.
It was a wild game where you could’ve easily seen the Seahawks win 34-3, or could have just as easily seen the game tied in the final moments, there were truly that many massive swing plays.
Let’s break down the win and what it means.
Week one was rough, but it was really rough for guys like Kenneth Walker, Cooper Kupp and Riq Woolen. On Sunday, all three played really well and showed their potential on this team.
Woolen might have lost his starting job last game if it wasn’t for the injury to Devon Witherspoon. With his back against the wall, he stepped up and showed again the potential top corner talent he has. A motivated Riq paired with what Josh Jobe has been doing, this secondary is going to be elite when Spoon and Emmanwori return.
Cooper Kupp looked fresh and a high level number two receiver against a banged up Steelers secondary. He caught seven of nine targets for 90 yards and looked strong after the catch, moving the chains multiple times. If he can provide anything close to that level of production this year, then this passing game will be fine.
Arguably the biggest winner on Sunday was Walker. After a week that saw a near unanimous (myself included) push for Zach Charbonnet to take the lead running back job, angry K9 showed up on the field and was incredible.
Aggressive, powerful runs that looked decisive, K9 had 105 rushing yards on 13 carries, including the game sealing touchdown run. He also had a 13 yard reception in what was one of the best days we’ve seen him in nearly two years.
We may never see both Walker and Charbonnet humming at the same time, but it was a reminder what these two are capable of the last two weeks.
Sunday was a second week of evidence that this defense has the makings of something special. Two brutal mistakes last week allowed the 49ers to reach 17 points, but they lost half of their team to injury in the process. This week, on the road against a team that put up 32 to the week before, Seattle gave up only 17 again, with 10 of the points coming off short fields after turnovers.
There are a ton of reasons why this defense currently looks like a top five unit, but the emergence of Byron Murphy II is arguably the biggest. After a rookie season that looked like a learning and growing experience, Murphy was good last week and looked like a game wrecker in Pittsburgh.
With five tackles and 1.5 sacks, Byron...
