The identity of the Seattle Seahawks has been pretty simple to spot since Pete Carroll was brought in as the head coach in January of 2010. His philosophy has preached a strong running attack as well as a shutdown defense. He has also been a big advocate for competition amongst the players, giving everybody a chance to earn their playing time by proving that they are the best.
It took some time for Carroll and General Manager John Schneider to turn the defensive unit around but they made the biggest splash to their future defensive success in their first draft as a Front Office. With their second selection of the first round in the 2010 NFL Draft, the Seattle Seahawks selected Costless Safety Earl Thomas out of the University of Texas with a pick they received from the Denver Broncos to complete a trade from the 2009 Draft.
Most of the experts expected Seattle to use both of their first round picks on offensive players. They were almost all correct in projecting that the Hawks would select Russell Okung with the sixth selection but what they would do with their second pick was not that easy. Some pundits expected Seattle to pick Jimmy Clausen out of Notre Dame, some expected them to go with C.J. Spiller out of Clemson. Earl Thomas was projected to be a Top 15 pick but nobody expected him to end up with the Seahawks.
The Seahawks would pick up two more of their key defensive cogs with their next four picks starting in the fourth round. They originally held the 104th pick in the draft but traded it along with a sixth-round pick to the Tennessee Titans for running back LenDale White, defensive tackle Kevin Vickerson and two picks in the 2010 Draft.
When the clock came around seven picks later for Seattle, the Seahawks took a chance on an injury-prone cornerback with the Oregon Ducks. His name was Walter Thurmond III and he was selected to be the replacement for Kelly Jennings, who was entering his fifth season with Seattle at age 27. Thurmond was an instrumental part of the Seattle defense playing the “nickel” role during the 2012 and 2013 seasons.
Carroll and Schneider had another diamond in their sights selecting Safety Kam Chancellor out of Virginia Tech with the 133rd pick of the 2010 Draft. This pick was also acquired in a trade, this time with the Detroit Lions. Chancellor was the 10th safety selected in the draft behind players like Taylor Mays, Morgan Burnett, Major Wright, Chad Jones, and Darrell Stuckey. The interesting thing about it was that Chancellor was rated sixth among safeties by NFL Draft Scout and was projected to be a late third or early fourth round selection.
The Seattle Seahawks won the NFC West with a record of 7-9. They defeated the New Orleans Saints in a wild game at CenturyLink Field 41-36. That game featured the famous “Beast Quake” run of Marshawn Lynch where he broke at least six tackles en route to the game-winning touchdown run. Seattle lost in the divisional round to the Chicago Bears 35-24 at Soldier Field to end the first season of the Pete Carroll era.
The 2010 Defense was not one to write home to Mom and Dad about. They finished the regular season as the 27th ranked defense in the National Football League allowing 368.6 yards per game. The breakdown in yardage was 249.6 passing yards per game and 118.9 rushing yards per game. They also allowed 25.4 points per game.
The 2011 NFL Draft brought another wave of key defensive players as the Seahawks used six of their final seven picks on the defense. All of those selections were made in the fourth round and beyond, a majority of them were picks acquired via trade.
Two offensive linemen were selected with the early selections as the Seahawks picked up James Carpenter out of Alabama and John Moffitt out of Wisconsin.
The 99th pick came around and it was time for the Seahawks to make their third selection in the Draft. They went to the SEC and selected linebacker K.J. Wright out of Mississippi State. The 6-foot-4, 246 pounder out of Olive Branch, Mississippi recorded 98 tackles during his senior season with the Bulldogs. He was a very good linebacker who earned a starting spot before his sophomore year. Wright started 35 of the final 37 games during his college career.
K.J. Wright was actually selected to provide depth at the linebacker position behind Top 5 selection from the 2009 Draft Aaron Curry. Wright would be promoted to a starting linebacker spot in Week 3 of his rookie season after Curry struggled mightily during the first few games of the season.
Seattle went back to the defensive backfield with their first selection of the fifth round selecting defensive back Richard Sherman out of Stanford. Sherman was a very interesting pick in the eyes of many experts who did not see him going until the seventh round. He was brought into Stanford as a wide receiver originally before switching to cornerback as a junior when he earned 112 tackles at the position. “The Best Corner In The Game” was rated as the 24th best cornerback in his draft class.
One of the things that made Sherman different from the typical cornerback mold is his size. He stands 6-foot-3, which would make him a better option to cover the taller receivers of the National Football League. Tall receivers were becoming all the rage with players like Demaryius Thomas, Dez Bryant, A.J. Green, and Julio Jones being selected high in their respective drafts.
Their next impact selection came in the form of defensive back Byron Maxwell out of Clemson. Maxwell had a very good career in college totaling 165 tackles during his four years in the ACC. He only made eight starts during his four years but was a prominent member of the special teams unit. Maxwell made 45 tackles on special teams and also caused six forced fumbles with his hard hitting style.
Finally, Seattle would select linebacker Malcolm Smith out of USC. He was somebody who had played for Pete Carroll during the tail end of the coach’s time at Southern Cal. Interestingly enough, Smith would make enough big plays during Super Bowl XLVIII to win the Most Valuable Player award.
Seattle had a setback in 2011 once again finishing 7-9 but this time, it was only good for 3rd in the division. They did get some great news as both Earl Thomas and Kam Chancellor were selected to the Pro Bowl.
Their defense though made a huge step forward finishing in the Top 10 of the league in total defense for the first time since 1997. They allowed 332.2 yards per game with the yardage breakdown looking like this: 219.9 passing yards per game and 112.3 rushing yards per game. They also allowed only 19.7 points per game, an improvement of nearly six points per game.
With all of the questioned picks by Seattle though, the 2012 NFL Draft saw two of the more puzzling for them. We will only discuss the first one though as the second one is Russell Wilson.
The team originally held the 12th pick in the first round but traded to the Philadelphia Eagles for three selections including the 15th pick and the 172nd pick (which they would use to select cornerback Jeremy Lane out of Northwestern State). Their pick eventually came up where they would select defensive end Bruce Irvin out of West Virginia. Irvin was an interesting selection at the time because he was really a hybrid end/linebacker with some very good speed. He ran a 4.5 40 yard dash which was actually faster than Richard Sherman ran the year before.
Irvin did not even make the first round mock draft of Sports Illustrated NFL Guru Peter King who projected that Seattle would select Melvin Ingram out of South Carolina. He did get the hybrid position correct but not the player.
Seattle stuck with the linebacker position for their second selection picking up middle linebacker Bobby Wagner out of Utah State. Wagner was rated as one of the best linebackers in the 2012 Draft having finished with 445 career tackles during his four years as a starter for the Aggies.
Wagner made an immediate impression on the coaching staff earning the starting spot at middle linebacker in his rookie season. He has since started 44 of 45 combined regular season and postseason games since Week 1 of 2012. He has 354 career tackles as of this past Sunday’s win over the Arizona Cardinals.
The final impact draft pick on the defense came in the form of Jeremy Lane. He was selected in the sixth round out of Northwestern State and has been a very good depth player in the secondary for Seattle. He was slated to be a starting corner for Seattle in the 2014-15 season but has missed the year after suffering a groin injury in Week 1.
The Seahawks made another big jump, this time in the standings finishing with an 11-5 record and a win over the Washington Redskins in the postseason before falling in a heartbreaker to the Atlanta Falcons in the Divisional Round.
Seattle improved once again in their defensive statistics moving up to 4th in the league allowing 306.2 yards per game. Their yardage breakdown was 203.1 passing yards and 103.1 rushing yards. They also led the league with only 15.3 points allowed per game.
They have taken another step forward in the past two seasons as they finished #1 in the league in total defense in 2013 and will likely finish in that spot as well barring a defensive collapse in Week 17. Seattle allowed 273.6 total yards per game with the breakdown being 172.0 passing yards and 101.6 rushing yards. They allowed only 14.4 points per game on their way to the team’s first Super Bowl Championship in February 2014.
So far in 2014, they have allowed 268.6 total yards per game with 184.5 of those coming through the air and only 84.1 yards per game coming on the ground. They have allowed 16.5 points per game which is good for top in the league by just four points over the Detroit Lions.
Seattle is currently sitting in the driver's seat for the number one seed in the 2014 NFC Playoffs. They will get that as long as they win and the game between the Green Bay Packers and Detroit Lions does not end in a tie. That is a very good possibility with the way this defense is playing, especially in the last five weeks.
How important has the Draft been for the Seattle Seahawks organization? All of the linebackers and defensive backfield who started on December 21st, 2014 against the Arizona Cardinals were selected between 2010 and 2012 by John Schneider and Pete Carroll. The scarier part is that Kam Chancellor, Michael Bennett, K.J. Wright, Earl Thomas, Richard Sherman, and Cliff Avril are all signed to long-term contracts. So as good as this defense has been over the last few years, they could continue to dominate for the next few seasons as well.