Field Gulls
Last week, after the Seattle Seahawks beat the Pittsburgh Steelers, many national media sites moved Seattle up in their weekly rankings. However, how will that change after the Seahawks completely dismantled the New Orleans Saints 44-13 in Week 3?
This week there is a lot more parity in the national media’s rankings of Seattle. Last week there were rankings as low as 20 and as high as 14. This week, the five media sites reviewed (Bleacher Report, Yahoo Sports, ESPN, NFL.com, and Pro Football Talk all rank Seattle at either 14th or 13th. Lets look at those who have the Seahawks 14th in the league first.
Yahoo sports, who moved Seattle from 19 to 14th on their list this week, noted that since blowing the week one game against the San Francisco 49ers, have looked “like a buzzsaw” and may be a “very good team everyone is sleeping on early in the season.” Bleacher Report, who similarly moved the Seahawks up six spots from 20 to 14, noted the impressive performances by Sam Darnold show that his “2024 Pro Bowl campaign in Minnesota doesn’t look like a fluke” and that the Seahawks offense should look well balanced between Darnold and the running backs (Kenneth Walker III and Zach Charbonnet) if they can stay healthy. ESPN also moved Seattle up to 14, up four spots from 18 last week. In their analysis, ESPN noted that you would “have to nitpick to find any flaws” in Seattle’s defense, who is allowing the second-fewest points per game at 15.7.
If those three power rankings and analysis did not seem positive enough, the rankings from NFL.com and Pro Football Talk (PFT) are even better. PFT moved Seattle up three spots, from 16 to 13. NFL.com did similar, moving Seattle up one spot, from 14 to 13. In addition to noting the impressive performances by Seattle’s offense, defense, and special teams, NFL.com noted that Seattle was able to blow out the Saints, something that both the 49ers and Arizona Cardinals could not do. Despite this, the article additionally noted that the Seahawks’ true litmus test for Seattle will be the next three games: at the Cardinals, home versus the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and at the Jacksonville Jaguars.
After Week 2, the average power ranking among the five sites (NFL.com, PFT, Bleacher Report, ESPN, and Yahoo) was 17.4. After Week 3, the average power ranking between these same five sites is 13.6. As can be seen in this positive trend, the overall consensus from the national media seems to be optimistic about Seattle. However, the national media still is not confident enough in Mike Macdonald’s team to put them into the top ten of the league. This Thursday night against the Cardinals will be another big test for Seattle to see if they can change that and get themselves into the top ten for this next week.
