Seahawks ranked #10 by Sports Illustrated
Despite an early playoff exit in 2015, the Seahawks remain an NFL powerhouse and genuine Super Bowl contender.
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Sports Illustrated does not seem to agree, though. To hear Chris Burke tell it, the party is over and head coach Pete Carroll has completely lost his mind along with any semblance of an offensive line. Burke wrote up SI’s latest NFL power rankings and he had Seattle coming in at number 10 overall, and that’s not even the worst of it.
Get a whiff of this snark-bomb:
“Even with first-rounder Germain Ifedi arriving, the offensive line still projects to be a mess… I’m not going to tell Pete Carroll how to do his job, but I’m also not going to stop him if he wants to eliminate his line altogether for a two-QB, five-RB scheme.”
Wow. Let’s take a moment to digest that one and maybe take a shot of bourbon before continuing. More after the jump…
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Where to begin?
The Seahawks are still a top five team
Maybe Pete Prisco’s dark magic has advanced to the point where he can inhabit Burke’s mind and write hateful and ignorant things about the Seahawks from two places at once. Maybe Burke is just genuinely concerned that Seattle’s offensive line will get Russell Wilson injured at some point this season. Either way, his attitude and ranking are both way off-base.
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First of all, Burke has no cause to suggest Pete Carroll is an idiot for not upgrading his offensive line. The tired “I’m not telling him how to do his job” is particularly rich and condescending.
Ranking the Chiefs, Vikings, Bengals, Broncos and Steelers ahead of the Seahawks also shows that Burke does not have a clear picture of the NFL’s elite teams.
Seattle has fielded the league’s top scoring defense four years in a row and made it to the playoffs five of the last six years. Most of that time the offensive line has been a mess. It was a mess when they won Super Bowl 48 and it was a mess when they lost to Carolina in January. Why would a bad offensive line unit be cause for disaster now?
Yes, the unit is a serious source of concern and the Seahawks need to figure out a way to address it. That does not change the fact that they’re deeper, more talented, and better suited to contend for multiple championships than any other team in the NFL right now. Even with five cardboard cutouts playing the offensive line Seattle is a top five team.
Placing them tenth overall is a dramatic underestimation. Period.
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