Russell Wilson vs. Packers - 14/29, 209 yards, 1 TD, 4 INTs

While analyzing the film in this game, what you’ll notice is that Wilson took far too many sacks. Some were his fault, but others were directly the fault of his offensive lineman. Needless to say, the Seahawks need to shore up their offensive line before they take on Chandler Jones and Rob Ninkovich of the Patriots. This can be seen in Plays 3 and 15 where the offensive line gets manhandled by the Packers.

Play 3
Situation: 2nd and 7 at SEA 23
Description: Q1 - (4:32) R.Wilson sacked at SEA 20 for -3 yards (J.Peppers).

In this play, watch RT78 Bailey gets pushed to the ground easily by LB56 Peppers on the speed rush outside and subsequent cut inside. Bailey is backpedaling very hard to stay with Peppers and the sudden push by Peppers knocks Bailey off-balanced to the ground.

Play 15
Situation: 1st and 15 at GB 44
Description: Q3 - (8:02) R.Wilson sacked at SEA 41 for -15 yards (C.Matthews). Penalty on SEA-J.Sweezy, Unnecessary Roughness, declined.

This is the controversial play where Matthews lands on top of Wilson, and Sweezy pushes him off. The final call was that it was a live-ball penatly versus a dead-ball penalty, which is why the next play it was 2nd and 30 instead of 2nd and 45. In this play, Matthews uses the double swipe to beat LT76 Okung to the inside to chase down Wilson for the sack. This was a great inside move by Matthews and pursuit to pull down Wilson who has the mobility to escape most edge rushers.

In Plays 11 and 26, Wilson takes two sacks that were his fault due to holding onto the ball too land and staring down his receivers.

Play 11
Situation: 1st and 10 at SEA 26
Description: Q2 - (:35) (Shotgun) R.Wilson sacked at SEA 25 for -1 yards (M.Burnett).

In this play, RG64 Sweezy gets beaten off of the line of scrimmage and thrown to the ground by Peppers disrupting Wilson’s progressions. The reason why this sack is Wilson’s fault is because on the left side of the field this is a very quick developing play that should have gone to the sideline with 35 seconds left in the half. If the Seahawks wanted to run out the clock on this play, they would have just ran the ball with RB24 Lynch instead of calling a passing play.

On the left side of the field, the left slot receiver is going up against off-man coverage while the left outside receiver has a defender in bump-and-run coverage. The left slot receiver runs a quick out route while the left outside WR runs a slant route. This is a PERFECT setup for a quick pass to the sideline for Wilson, but he doesn’t take it and instead looks to the middle of the field to find the spot route run by the TE. It doesn’t make sense, why Wilson would go over the middle here when the easy and correct route is the quick out on this play.

Play 26
Situation: 1st and 10 at GB 45
Description: Q4 - (7:52) (No Huddle, Shotgun) R.Wilson sacked at 50 for -5 yards (M.Burnett).

In this play, Wilson finds is slot left receiver running a deep-out route, but he doesn’t move on to his other progresssions. If you watch the right side of the field, the wide receiver makes his cut on the deep-in route, which the defender stumbles and loses his balance. If Wilson moved on to his other receivers he would have found this for an easy long completion. Instead, Wilson stares down his slot receiver and gets taken down for a sack of 5 yards by the safety blitz.

Outside of some of these plays in the first three and a half quarters, Wilson actually had some good throws in the beginning of the game before the Seahawks started clicking. This can be seen in Plays 17 and 25.

Play 17 - Wilson takes an off-center snap from shotgun and instantly finds RB24 Lynch on the wheel route. The ball is well placed for Lynch to catch it, but LB58 Barrington makes an excellent pass breakup.

Play 25 - This is a packaged play from the read-option where WR89 Baldwin runs a wheel route around the back left side of the field. This is an excellent play design that completley fools the Packers defense into committing on the read-option fake. Wilson takes the snap and fakes the handoff to Lynch moving back-right before he lobs the ball over to Baldwin perfectly, but Baldwin drops it. Once the ball hits Baldwin’s hands he had at least 10 yards of clean running room before he would have had to make his first contact with a defender. What an excellent play call on 2nd and 6 to fool the aggressive front 7 of the Packers.

Play 16
Situation: 3rd and 19 at GB 48
Description: Q3 - (6:51) (Shotgun) R.Wilson pass deep right to D.Baldwin to GB 19 for 29 yards (C.Matthews). Penalty on GB-C.Matthews, Illegal Use of Hands, declined.

Offensive Formation: Shotgun Trips Left Bunch Far
Offense Personnel: 11
Defensive Formation: Cover 3 with 5 underneath zones

On 3rd and 19, the Packers go into prevent defense and only rush 2 defenders while keeping one in QB spy over the middle. This is such a terribly conservative call on 3rd and long that it ends up beating the Packers, because it gives Wilson a free shot into the coverage. Baldwin runs a post route from the left slot and eventually just sits between the underneath zones and the Cover 3 shell over top. Wilson’s ball is delivered slightly too high, but Baldwin does a great job of hauling it in for the 29 yard gain and the first down.

On the next page we will take a look at some of the plays that started going well for the Seahawks once they started clicking offensively that earned them the spot to the playoffs in the first place.

Please continue reading on the next page.