Takeaways from Seahawks 21-20 win over Cardinals

The Seattle Seahawks put themselves in a position where their postseason hopes were no longer in their control with last week's loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

And while Geno Smith led yet another come-from-behind victory for Seattle to finish the regular season with a 21-20 win over the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday, the Seahawks didn't get the help they needed and will have to watch the playoffs from home.

That's a massive disappointment for a team that was 6-3 and in first place in the NFC West at the midpoint of the season.

"It sucks man," said receiver Tyler Lockett, who caught the final touchdown and two-point conversion that gave Seattle the win. "It sucks not being able to make it to the playoffs. We was in the same situation last year and, you know, the team we needed to win ended up doing it. This year, I mean, you know, we put ourselves in some tough situations, some games we should've won, but we let slip away."

A Seahawks team that was 6-3 and leading the NFC West at one point this season, will have to watch the playoffs from home. Just like a season ago, the Seahawks needed Green Bay to lose their final game of the year to give Seattle a chance to backdoor into the playoffs. But the Chicago Bears were unable to replicate the Week 18 upset the Detroit Lions managed last year to get the Seahawks into the dance. A 17-9 Packers victory on Sunday meant Seattle is the first team out of the playoffs in the NFC.

"It's a freaking crusher. It's a total crusher," head coach Pete Carroll said. "There's so many games in the season that we take with us. These games don't go away. Whether it's Rams, whether it's Dallas, whether it's Pittsburgh, it's Rams again. I mean, you know, there's so many games like this, that they just tear at you. That's what you have to live with."

A 3-5 finish to the season over the final eight games served to derail a year that had so much promise. Significant regression as the year progressed from the defense and offensive line served to undermine Seattle’s success. It took Geno Smith authoring five separate fourth quarter, game-winning drives this season to even get to those nine wins.

"For us to kind of let our own destiny slip out of our hands, I think that's something that frustrates me a little bit, you know, because we had a chance," Smith said. "We had a chance to get into the playoffs and see what we can do. But, you know, we won today. That's all we could have done is to get to win today. And, you know, the rest is kind of up to what we did last week."

But there will be plenty of time to dissect the entire season for the Seahawks. For now, we'll keep the focus on what was the final game of the year for Seattle in the win over Arizona.

Geno Smith closes the season with another game-winning drive:

On the long list of issues for the Seahawks to solve moving forward, the level of play from the quarterback position isn't high on the list.

Geno Smith capped a second straight strong season under center for the Seahawks by setting an NFL record in the process. Per the Elias Sports Bureau, Smith's touchdown pass to Tyler Lockett and subsequent two-point conversion served as the seventh time this season Smith had thrown a touchdown pass that gave Seattle the lead in a fourth quarter or overtime, which is a new record.

Smith had two such passes in Seattle's wins over Detroit and Tennessee, and also delivered in wins over Cleveland, Washington and Arizona.

In total, Smith authored game-winning drives in five games this season (Detroit, Cleveland, Washington, Tennessee, Arizona), and nearly had a sixth instance against the Los Angeles Rams only for a missed field goal to thwart the effort in a 17-16 loss.

"I think Geno had a fantastic season for us and what he could do," Carroll said. "We wish we would have done better around him, but I think he did his stuff and showed hisd mettle by how he could hang in no matter how difficult the situation was. He’s done it so many times, it couldn’t be more obvious."

Smith completed 16-of-28 passes for 189 yards and two touchdowns in leading Seattle to the win in Arizona. The Seahawks marched 67 yards on four plays with the 34-yard strike to Lockett serving as the dagger.

Smith missed two games due to injury and still managed to throw for 3,624 yards for the season with 20 touchdowns, nine interceptions and a 64.7 percent completion percentage. If Smith had delivered a season-average performance in the two games he missed, he would have had over 4,100 yards passing.

"I got better as a quarterback and that is all that I can ask for myself," Smith said. "I pushed every single day. Didn’t miss a single day. I was there early, left late and I gave it all that I got. I know that I can be better in some areas. I’m working to improve on those but I am appreciative of all of these moments because they always lead to something greater."

By the final drive of the game, the Seahawks knew they had been eliminated from the playoffs due to Green Bay's win over Chicago, but Smith didn't let that deter him from wanting to lead the team to a victory anyway.

"That is not going to dictate the way that I am playing the game," Smith said. "I am going to go out there and try to win at any cost.  So shoot man, it took for us to go out there and get it done in the second half and for us to really take it down on that last drive. I liked the way the guys finished. They played until the end. The guys played hard and we finished."

The play of Smith was a slight step back statistically from his standout season a year ago. However, Smith proved again he's an upper echelon NFL quarterback that nearly drug a flawed team to the postseason for a second straight year.

"I know that I am a championship quarterback," Smith said. "I know that I am going to continue to lead and continue to be great. I just have to continue to push and get better and help the guys around me get better. That is really where my focus is." 

Seahawks defense remains broken and how to fix in remains unclear.

Sure, the Seahawks only allowed 20 points to the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday. However, that comes with the caveat that two missed field goals by Matt Prater in the fourth quarter would have added to the total and given Seattle another loss on their record as well.

Arizona put up 466 yards of total offense with 206 yards coming on the ground. James Conner's 150 yards and a touchdown on 27 carries led the way as Seattle's run defense continued to crater in the second half of the season.

Fixing the run defense was such an emphasis for the team this offseason coming off last year's performance where they finished 30th in the league with over 150 yards per game allowed. The emphasis seems to have made a difference with Seattle holding each of their first five opponents under 115 rushing yards with two games against Carolina and Cincinnati with less than 50 yards allowed.

But Seattle has had teams rush for at least 125 yards in 10 of their last 12 games this season with three games of over 200 yards allowed, including each of the last two weeks against Pittsburgh and Arizona. 

"We didn’t execute as well as we needed to execute," linebacker Bobby Wagner said. "I think starting early on we were putting some much emphasis on making sure that wasn’t a thing and you saw that teams started to throw the ball and you try to balance that and then stuff happens. It is more so just finding ways to get off the field, making sure you do your job and I’m pretty sure I’ll watch the (tape of the) whole season so if you see me around ask me again and I’ll have an answer for you in a couple weeks."

Despite the focus on fixing the rushing game, the Seahawks once again ranked 30th in the league in rushing yards allowed with just over 150 yards per game.

Beyond just the rushing defense, it's been five years since the Seahawks last finished in the top half of the league in total defense. Since the 2018 season when Seattle finished exactly at the midpoint at 16th overall, the Seahawks have ranked 26th (2019), 22nd (2020), 28th (2021), 26th (2022), and 30th (2023).

And looking forward, it's not easy to figure out how the team can fix it. Bobby Wagner, Jordyn Brooks, Leonard Williams and Mario Edwards will all be free agents. The health and future of Jamal Adams remains a massive concern. The investment in the safety position between Adams, Quandre Diggs and Julian Love takes a massive chunk of salary cap space. That's a lot of questions that will have be sufficiently answered for a unit that needs to take a significant step forward for Seattle to truly compete again.

Bobby Wagner, Tyler Lockett, Will Dissly come up big in what could be their final games with Seahawks.

Bobby Wagner is set to be an unrestricted free agent in March, while Tyler Lockett and Will Dissly each have contracts that could become too pricey for Seattle to keep heading into the 2024 season.

But if these were their last days in Seahawks' uniforms, the long-time fixtures in Seattle left with a memorable send-off.

Wagner had 15 tackles against Arizona on Sunday to finish with a career-high 183 tackles for the season, which is the most in the NFL this season and just one tackle shy of Jordyn Brooks' franchise record of 184 tacklers set during the 2021 season.

"The way he answered the call and the way he was able to go 17 weeks in his 12 years of football and he’s still in the peak of shape and condition and performance and look at his numbers. It’s just amazing that he can do that," Carroll said.

Lockett finished with just two receptions on the day. However, those two receptions accounted for 71 total yards on catches for 37 and 34 yards, respectively, including the game-winning pass from Geno Smith with 1:54 left to play. It also doesn't count Lockett's catch for the successful two-point conversion that gave Seattle the 21-20 lead.

"Lock was on it and then here he did it again," Carroll said. We’ve been coming here for years. I think we’ve played 16 times here since I’ve been in Seattle, and I don’t know but Lock must have made a winning touchdown catch in most of those. He made a great play today to put us out there and to give us the chance."

Meanwhile, Dissly scored his first touchdown of the season on a 19-yard pass from Smith in the second quarter that gave the Seahawks a 10-3 lead at the time. It's been Dissly's least productive season as a receiver with the team moving to move three wide receiver sets with the addition of Jaxon Smith-Njigba to the offense, but Dissly got on the board to help Seattle win their final game of the year.

And a mention to Jordyn Brooks as well, who was unable to finish Sunday's game due to an ankle injury. Brooks had a terrific season after recovering from a torn ACL last January. 

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