Field Gulls
Following a 2024 season in which the run game of the Seattle Seahawks was non-existent for the majority of the year, head coach Mike Macdonald immediately moved on from offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb.
Along with firing Grubb, the Seahawks allowed several other members of the offensive coaching staff to move on to other opportunities elsewhere, including offensive line coach Scott Huff.
To fill the openings that had been created, the team turned to Klint Kubiak and a cadre of coaches with a long history of coaching run-heavy offensive systems. The additions included adding John Benton as offensive line coach and Rick Dennison as run game coordinator.
Benton’s resume included long stints as the o-line coach for the Houston Texans during the tenure of Kubiak’s father, Gary, as the head coach, along with a four year stint in the same role with the San Francisco 49ers. In both stops Benton coached offensive linemen to block in wide-zone heavy schemes handed down from Mike Shanahan and Alex Gibbs with the Denver Broncos.
Likewise, Dennison’s history included taking over as the offensive line coach of the Broncos under Shanahan when Alex Gibbs opted to depart for the Atlanta Falcons, before spending time with Gary Kubiak in both Houston and a return to Denver in 2015 that saw the Broncos hoist the Lombardi trophy in 2015.
In short, the coaching staff came in with a track record of success coaching teams with a ground-heavy attack, and in particular a long history of coaching rushing attacks that relied heavily on outside zone. That combination of experience and the raw youth and inexperience of the Seattle offensive line had many fans expecting, or at least hoping for, a breakout season for the ground game in 2025.
That, however, has not developed.
That then raises the question about what has been holding the run game back. Is it once again the inexperience of the offensive line? Is it the coaching staff? Is it the running backs?
The answer is that it’s a combination of several factors, and one that is sufficiently complicated to warrant its own post at a later time and date. Before getting to that post, though, it’s necessary to have a foundational understanding of some key background data. Specifically, if the coaching staff has a long history of implementing and deploying rushing attacks designed around zone blocking, in particular outside zone, then it would make sense for the current usage of zone blocking to be similar to usage at past stops as well.
Thus, the first step is to look back at the two stops where Klint Kubiak was offensive coordinator and had play calling duties with the 2021 Minnesota Vikings and the 2024 New Orleans Saints. Here is how often those two teams ran behind zone blocking versus man blocking.
Moving on to the 2024 New Orleans Saints, here is what the breakdown looks like.
Not only does the total percentage come out very similar to the numbers from the 2021 Vikings, seven...
