FIRST LOOK: Seahawks Face Struggling Chargers

0:00Good morning, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Hot Blogger Mornings. I am Brian M. Howzer. You can find me all the things that we do not only here on YouTube, but you can find us on Instagram, on TikTok, and you can also find us on Hot Blogger.com. All new, refreshed. Hot Blogger.com, which even this morning got a little bit cooler. Some new stuff up there for you guys to all see. We'll talk about it a little bit later on. This episode is brought to you by Pemko Insurance, been serving Northwest families for 75 years, Oregon, Washington. They've been serving my family for over a couple decades. Go to go.penko.com slash Hot Blogger to learn more. It's also brought to you by PrizePix. And it's Wednesday, which means a lot of things. It means it's a double pod day. You're going to get first look right

1:00now. We're going to dive deep into this Chargers team. Then we have Real Hawk Talk tonight. Evan Hill, Jeff Simmons, Nathan Ernst. I'll be there to talk about this game, give our predictions. We will also have our first injury report at four o'clock. We're going to look at what's going on with Julian Love. Do the Seahawks open the practice window for Zach Sharvane at one o'clock today in the transaction windows. What we'll find about, find out about that. We will talk to Mike McDonald at his press conference. And I will have some locker room interviews that will be available, not only for patrons, patreon.com slash hot blogger where you get ad free audio, but also Apple podcast Spotify wherever you want to get it. People seem to be enjoying the locker room interviews. So we'll have those up there as well. All right. So I just finished this morning. And reason I'm a little bit late is I just finished watching the Chargers play the bills. And one of the things that you know, I know I spent a lot of time on numbers, but I do watch a lot of football as well and try to

2:06have that be a companion to my analysis because I don't think the numbers ever tell the full story. And if you know anything about what happened with the bills Chargers game this weekend, the numbers really don't I don't think tell the story in some ways. The Chargers had five takeaways in this game. Five. And they lost, which is wild. And they were they were leading almost this entire game. The bills came back and won it in the fourth quarter. But I came away with some pretty clear impressions of this team. And then we're going to look at the numbers. We're going to look at the lineup changes like we always do. And we'll see where there's some strengths and some weaknesses. But the Chargers are winless. Just like the commanders were winless going into last week's game. But there's a pretty big difference between these two teams. And I know I've seen the comments. People

3:09think that I am underestimating the commanders. We will see if the commanders win more than five games this year, you can come back and talk to me about it. Until then, I don't think that's a good team. I think that's going to be a top 10 pick team. I don't think they're going to make playoffs. The Chargers very well may not make the playoffs either. In fact, they have a worse record than the commanders right now. They're all in three. But there's talent there. There is. And that defense, the defense that they play, I think is better than the numbers indicate. And I think they have some decent pass rush. I think that they have some sticky coverage, some hard-hitting safeties. I think that there's some playmaking in that group. And I think it's pretty well coached defensively. So I think the defense to me comes in and I think looks frisky. So I will go into some

4:12of the specifics on these players and on the scheme and that stuff in a bit. But I already, you know, I have more respect for the Chargers defense than I did for the commanders defense. Offensively. They've been awful. They've been awful this year. And we'll go into how bad in just a minute. But there's a difference between the commanders and the Chargers in that. I've been very clear. I do not believe that Justin Herbert deserves and has earned the amount of praise that he gets from the analyst community. I think he looks the part and I don't mean that from the color of his skin. I mean that from tall, lanky, strong arm, pocket player, like all the things that are kind of classic quarterbacks. He looks the, like he walks off the set of quarterback casting, right?

5:16But I don't think, I think he is crumbled in the playoffs, which is statistically verifiable. And I just see an inconsistent player that does not belong in the conversation with Joe Burrow and Josh Allen and Patrick Mahomes and like the best quarterbacks in the NFL. I think he's, he's one of the most talented quarterbacks and that I wouldn't, wouldn't argue. But my point in all this is while I adamantly believe that he is overvalued by a lot of analysts that is much more about his potential and about his highlights about what he can do and he had some great throws in this game against the bills as well. I am not going to sit here and say he's a bad player and a player that you can overlook. And so we'll go into a couple other pieces here. But the kind of high level impression I have of the Chargers is that they have a pretty good defense

6:18top half of the league defense with the potential to be a top 10 defense if things start going their way offensively. So they have a decent defense and if their offense figures it out, they're pretty good team. And I think that's what everyone thought in preseason is that this could be Justin Herbert with Mike McDaniel, the new offensive coordinator, WizKid coming in from Miami after getting fired there that the two of them paired together was going to be fireworks. That hasn't happened so far. And I think the thing for Ceeox fans to be aware of is this is a much more dangerous team than O and three and the numbers that we're going to go through would indicate. That's my takeaway. And I think it's something to keep an eye on. And with that, let's start looking at who this team is. And first, we're going to look at lineups. We're going to

7:19do lineups a little bit more focused because the last couple of weeks we've been doing it based off the last time this team's faced off against each other. Since they all played each other last year, they played the commanders last year, they played the Cardinals last year, they played the Patriots last year. So this is with the Chargers. They haven't faced them for a while. So I wanted to focus on like who are the new guys who's changed in the lineup. And you're going to notice one thing in particular with this crew. So as I bring up the lineup card, you're going to see with the Chargers that we'll go through a bit by bit here. So Keaton Mitchell signed from Baltimore. He got a lot of carries in the Bills game. Has had a pretty decent year for them. He is lightning fast, very, very fast player, not the biggest guy, but can be a pretty explosive runner. And so that's one change.

8:22Wide receiver wise. Keaton Allen, no longer with the team, not as much change there. Tight end wise. Now they've got Alec Engold listed as a tight end. He's really a fullback. That's how he's being used. He's gotten used quite a bit in the Bills game as a receiver as well, not playing receiver, but as a receiver out of the backfield. And is a pretty stout blocker. So he's a big addition to their backfield as a fullback listed here as a tight end, but I'll fix that later. Charlie Kohler, who they got from Baltimore, also a very good blocker at tight end, but he missed last week's game and he is doubtful for I think this game. We're going to find out injury reports soon enough. David and Joku, who was with Cleveland last year, also a big part of their plan to be very heavy. I think they're going to be very tight end and fullback heavy was their plan. He's on IR. So they're

9:22missing their tight ends, which is a big deal for the way they want to play offense. But then offensive line is just a mess. We'll go into how good or not good these players are. But Joe Alt missed a lot of last year. He's their best offensive lineman. He's been in this year. He hasn't been as good as he was. Ration Slater, who was on IR for last year. He's back at the other tackle position. Then they've been playing Trevor Pining and Cole Strange at guard. And this is because of a lot of injuries. But I think Jake Slater has been at center. It's been a little bit of like just trying to pull things together. So Tray Pimpkins, who is going to play for them on IR, Tyler Biotich, who they signed from the commanders to play center, IR, Branson Taylor, IR. So they've got a lot of guys who they intended to

10:24be on their offensive line, who will not play in this game. The offensive line is a problem for them. Not for the sea ox for them. So advantage Seattle there will go into just how much as we go through this defensively. Adafee Owe was with them. He's now with the commanders just played him last week. A key mezzador. Their first round pick. He had a really nice sack against the bills. He's had a sack. I think in last couple games. Older player, which is part of why he lasted as long. But he absolutely looks the part of a premier ed rusher and showed some really flashy physical traits in that game against Buffalo. He's one to watch. I think he beat Deon Dawkins in that game for the sack. But I don't know. It was an impressive sack. Nice hand, you know, use of hands and to to knock the blockers hands away and also just the bend that he had to get around.

11:30And then defensive line wise. Dishon hand was one of their nose tackles. He's moved on to Atlanta. Dalvin Tomlinson, who folks should be familiar with, was with the Cardinals last year. He is now with the the Chargers. Denzel Paraman, one of their linebackers on IR. So Delishon Phillips has been getting snaps. And then finally, if you look at the secondary, Dante Jackson actually played last week. So even though he's listed as questionable here, he did play Benjamin St. Juice, who was with them last year's now with the the the Packers. And then you've got a low high Gilman who played with them last year's with the Chiefs. Genesis Smith, not a name that most people know, fourth round rookie that they picked this year. He had two interceptions against the

12:31bills. One of them was most unlikely interceptions you'd ever see. But he has been a productive player for them this year. We're going to get into some more specifics about how these guys have fared. This is a look at the Seahawks view. Obviously, Sam Donald's back. Zach Sharman, we know is potentially going to come off to start his practice window. He will not come off PUP until after week four at the earliest. Irv Charles still on IR. Jake Bobo, we know is on IR. Irv Charles also could be opening a practice window sooner rather than later. Robbie Euths, Anthony Bradford still out on IR for another two games. Actually, excuse me, another three games. So he went on IR after the Cardinals game, which means he has three more games that he will be out. And then Julian Love, that's one we're going to keep an eye on this week. Tio Cotta as well to see if he's back. Now, I want to go and share a little bit of a different

13:39view with you. And bear with me on this. This is a lot to take in and I'm going to zoom way in. So everyone can take a deep breath for a second. But what this is, let's first look at it at kind of this high level. This is looking at my value over replacement scores for every player in the NFL. And specifically, having all of the chargers highlighted. And the thing to kind of pay attention to here, let me try to give you a little bit of a more zoomed-in view. The thing to pay attention to here is actually let's do this. I'm going to make this a little, yeah, it doesn't work that well. Let's do it that way. The thing I would want to pay attention to here is how many chargers are in the top right quadrant. Right? So right of this line is above

14:51league average, above this line is above league average. Actually, this is snaps. Snaps is the horizontal value of a replacement is the value of replacement is a horizontal snaps is the vertical. So the more snaps they played the higher they are, the more valuable they are that far the to the right they are. So what is this telling us? It's telling us Tony Jefferson, their safety has been their most valuable player so far. He had a really nice game against the bills. Del Sean Phillips, the linebacker who's been playing as a replacement has been quite good. Ray Sean Slater, their right tackle has been quite good. So those three guys kind of stand out in the crowd of who's been really good for the chargers. Joe Alta has been okay. Dorewin James, Taribe Steal, another guy to kind of be aware of. Taribe Steal's been, he forced a fumble in this game. I think he did have a pick. I can't remember, but he had a decent game. But you see some of these guys,

15:54Tui Poeloto, the defensive lineman who is their best pass rusher. Khalil Max still doing it after all these years. Jamari Caldwell, you might remember from the Grazabel draft class where I interviewed him and Gray at the field on mobile when they both went up against each other and Grazabel said Jamari Caldwell was the guy that he was most impressed with. And I think he's had a decent start to his career as well. Amari and Hampton, they're running back. Physical dude, he is up there. But what you get over here, where are some guys that are below replacement level? Quentin Johnston, their former first round pick, the year that Jackson Smith and Jigbo was drafted, I believe, has been their worst player by this metric. Cole Strange, their guard has been their second worst player by this metric. Justin Herbert has been their third worst player by this metric.

16:57So we can zoom in even a little further on this part of the quadrant. So you guys can see a little bit more. You know, Cam Hart as a corner has not been good. Jake Slotter, their center has not been good. Trey Harris, the receiver has not been good. So these are some areas of some potential weakness to keep an eye on. Now they've got to keep mezzatore down here. I do. It's my scoring. Now down, just means he hasn't played as many snaps, but he's pretty close to replacement level. I think he's been pretty good, at least from what I've seen. But data is what the data is. So we'll respect the data. But again, you just look at some of these guys that have been good for them. And it worth just kind of getting this view of kind of a high level view. You guys might be wanting to know where the Seahawks are on this. I'll do that really quickly. We're not going to spend as much time. But if I wanted to clear this and I want to see Seattle, I can see all the Seahawks on here as

17:57well. And so if we look at that this way, you can kind of see that a lot of the Seahawks end up in this top-right quadrant. And Julian Love should be no surprise that Julian Love has been their best player. JSN has been their second best, at least by this measure. Leonard Williams, Neomyah Pritchett has been really, really good. There's a lot of metrics that like what Neomyah has done this year, Charles Cross has been really, really good. Josh Job has been good, Gray Zabel, Devon Witherspoon. A lot of the Drew Locke has been very good. A lot of the guys that you would expect to see have been really good so far. And as far as who has not been as good for the Seahawks, does not like Jill and Sundell, does not like what Derek Hall has done, Rashid, she hid, Eric Sobert. Of course, Eric's not playing as many snaps, but that gives you an idea

19:03of some of the guys that this does not respect as much so far. And you'd like to see Byron Murphy, a little bit more to the right, you know? Like I think this guy's got so much potential, and he just does not necessarily be able to put the numbers out there. These guys down here, worth noting, they're doing really well. They're just not getting as many snaps. So you see, they're performing far above replacement level to the right, but they are not getting as many snaps as some of these other guys. So I wanted to share a little bit of that in terms of, you know, just a high level view. There's not as many standout players for the Chargers, but they do have some. And when you start looking at these teams overall and the matchups that kind of jump out, let's do that here. Do I have those? Oh, is it? No, no, no, sorry, let's not do that.

20:11Let's get the Chargers and this. And there we go. All right, so let's look at just kind of the overall view of these two teams. All right, this will give us a nice high level view of this stuff. And we're going to, uh, my goodness, why is it so annoying? I don't know. We'll just stick with what we got. So let's go to this view. That's a little bit better. Let's do this actually. So I'm playing around with things. I know I know you guys want to do this, but I kind of want it to be the right way. And we're going to do this. I'm going to go here. I'm going to go go. Quince.com slash surf splender. You know the staple pieces in your wardrobe that you always grab.

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23:34if you look at this, you've got, like, this is where it can get dangerous because you just see a lot of green, a lot of advantage for the C-Hawks. Chargers 30th in the NFL and point differential. Even with five turnovers in this last game, there's 17th in turnover differential, which is crazy. They're tied with the C-Hawks or even on the year. Efficiency wise and net EPA per play, net success rate, net escape rate. Keep in mind, this is offense and defense together. So it's what's your EPA per play on offense versus your EPA per play allowed on defense, your success rate on offense versus what's allowed on defense. C-Hawks are fourth in the NFL and EPA per play. They're second in net success rate. Even the game they lost against the commanders, they dominated these numbers. Chargers are 30th and 26th in those efficiency numbers. Their offense has just been bad. And that's really dragged it down. You'll see a little bit more of that. From a DVOA perspective, DVOA doesn't really respect the Chargers either. And they've got the 31st ranked DVOA team,

24:39second to worst team in the NFL, according to DVOA. Their special teams DVOA, 29th in the NFL. So like it's just been not not great, not great for the Chargers. And you know, as you look at the C-Hawks offense going up against what I think is a better Chargers defense than some of the numbers indicate. C-Hawks offense has not been excellent. I mean, it just hasn't been. It's been okay. And it has not been super efficient. The best thing that the C-Hawks have done is they're passing game. We'll get into that a little bit later. You do see that the Chargers are second in the NFL in turnovers forced with six, but they got five of those in one game. So I don't know that I do think that they are a dangerous defense, but I don't know if they're second in the NFL and take away dangerous. Josh Allen also made some poor choices, which by the way, our quarterback has as well. But if you look at the passing game for the C-Hawks, that's where one of the things that stands

25:42out to me. C-Hawks fourth in the NFL DVOA passing offense, the Chargers 25th in past defense, but you get to the rushing offense. C-Hawks are 30th in DVOA rush offense, 24th in DVOA and Chargers are 24th in run defense. So again, second straight week, the C-Hawks clear advantage seems to be through the air. And the bills were a very good, very good rushing team, including with Josh Allen as part of that rushing attack. They struggled to run the ball against the Chargers most of that game. So where did they end up? Let's see what they ended up in terms of numbers there. They ended up at 176 yards rushing. So, and over five yards of carry. But they were not dominating on the ground for much of that game. And I'm kind of curious. Oh, I'm not going to go

26:47back and look at up now, but I am curious how many of those yards came in the fourth quarter and the second half in general. So the other thing that is just going to be a continuing question for the C-Hawks, 11 personnel has just not the three receiver sets has not been good so far this year. And they are 26th in the NFL and EPA per play when they're in 11 personnel. That's whether they're passing or they're running, right? They are top seven in every other personnel package. Seventh in 12th personnel, fifth in 21, which is fullback, third in 22 when they have two two backs and two tight ends. So the three receiver sets better pick it up or they're just not going to ever be a common part of this offense. I don't know if that's like they weren't great in 11 personnel last year, but they are bad at it this year. And I think that that with the receiver talent that they've got, you got Tory Horton, you've got Rashid Shaheed, you've got players there.

27:52It should not be such a bad part of this offense. Now, maybe encouragingly, the chargers are 28th in the NFL in defending out of 11 personnel are defending 11 personnel sets. They're 25th in defending two tight end sets, but they're very good at defending fullback sets. Third in the NFL in that regard. So some interesting stuff they're personal wise, but this is the passing game. You just see all the green. We're not going to go through every number here, but look at all the green for the Seahawks in terms of their advantages in the passing game. And you know, the one place here that there's a blue bar for the chargers having advantages interception rate. That shouldn't be a huge surprise. But if you look at the chargers pressure rate is 19th, they're time to pressure 27th. They're sac rate 11th. So they're gotten more sacks than their pressure would indicate they should. Seahawks past protection has been pretty damn good.

28:58Like, so like I think better than even I would give it credit for. Fourth in pressure rate allowed. Third in time to pressure. Over three seconds to get to a pressure. Sac rate fourth. That's pretty good. That's really good. Also, when under pressure the Seahawks have been pretty good, top 10 passing team in that regard, but they're third from a clean pocket. So they're still very good in that regard. Interesting here for the chargers when the opposing quarterback is under pressure, they surrender the 30th EPA per pass. So when they get pressure, they're still giving up big place. That's an interesting one. And then again, we got to this personnel grouping thing. If there's going to be a team to attack with 11 personnel, this might be the team. Chargers 28th in the NFL defending three wide receiver sets in the passing game. Now, as far as the type of

30:03defense that the Seahawks are going to face, they're the second best team in the NFL when they're passing against a base defense. I don't know how often the chargers are going to be in base. They are a Mike McDonald style defense. They'll probably be a lot in nickel and dime. So I don't think you're going to get them in base very often. They have Dürwen James. They have a Nick Eman-Wary like player. So I don't think you're going to get them in base very often. From a receiving standpoint, Seahawks have not been good versus man. Now, I think this is going to change because Sam Donald absolutely eviscerates man coverage. He did this last year. He's been out other than one game. So he's only had one game back. I think this will start to normalize. But the chargers have not been good in man defense. 23rd, but they're mostly going to be a zone defense. Now, the Seahawks on the flip side, 3rd in the NFL against zone defense. So the thing to watch here, if this does not normalize, this becomes a Brian Flurry question because Sam Donald proven he is excellent

31:04against man coverage. If the Seahawks all of a sudden are not excellent against man coverage, then I would start having questions about whether Brian Flurry is putting his quarterback in his offense in good positions to win against man coverage. This is the routes that the Seahawks run. They are like notice that digs and outs, out breaking routes are their most frequently. They're first in the NFL and how much they're running dig routes. They're fifth and half in the running out routes. This is something that's going to come from, we talked to them about this with Matt Hasselbach, when you're in tight formations, it opens up those out routes and dig routes. So out breaking routes in general. Unfortunately, the Seahawks have not been that great in terms of targeting these routes. 17th, any paper play when targeting digs, 24th and targeting outs. The chargers have been relatively good at defending those and keep in mind, like they are familiar with that particular type of offense as well, down there in Los Angeles for the chargers.

32:12All right, it is worth noting though that the chargers are 31st in the NFL and defending out routes. That could be something to watch, which is one of the most comfortable throws for San Donald and this offense. So that could be something to keep an eye on. And then screen game. This is the other thing I wanted to highlight. The Seahawks, all of a sudden, after this last week, they've warmed up the screen game. It started against Arizona and they took it up a notch against the commanders. They're the third most common screen team in terms of how often they're doing it and they're the third in how good they are at it. That's good news. Chargers are 19th in defending screen plays so far this year. So that's another thing that could be a factor in this game. When you look at the run game, again, a lot of opponent advantages. Look at all the blue. Chargers are 12th in EPA per rush. They're 12th in explosive run rate. They're third when defending 21 personnel with a fullback. But some of this is not so great.

33:20Like rush success rate for the chargers is 18th, but the Seahawks are 21st offense. They're 24th in DVOA rush defense, but the Seahawks are 30th on offense. They're 27th in stuff to rate, which means that they hold someone to zero or negative yards. The Seahawks are 29th in that. So this isn't like the chargers or some powerhouse run defense. Seahawks just have been a pretty atrocious runoffence so far from an efficiency standpoint. Now, where the Seahawks have done their best work is when they've faced a nickel defense. So when a nickel defense is on the field, which the chargers are going to play a lot of, they've done a little bit, Seahawks have been a little bit better in run defense, and the chargers have not been great. Their 19th in defending runs out of that. A couple other things here just kind of scrolling through Seahawks, number two in the NFL and under center offense. Chargers are fourth in defending under center. That's not good.

34:24Like that's a concern because the Seahawks are a really good under center team. Now, the Seahawks have gone to 10th in shotgun offense, but they're 29th in the NFL and how often they use it. So they're not using shotgun very often. Chargers are 28th in defending shotgun. So this might be a game where you want to see a little bit more shotgun. At the same time, the chargers are 17th in the NFL in defending play action. So play action from shotgun, not as good as play action from under center. Some choices that Brian Flurry is going to have to make in this one there. Now, run concepts. Seahawks are facing a team that is very good at defending the outside zone. Their 7th is chargers are 7th in the NFL in defending outside zone runs. Seahawks are 25th in running it. So maybe some good news of chargers are 19th in defending power. Maybe that'll help on the

35:25goal line if the Seahawks can get there. Before we go in and start talking about the chargers defense or sorry, the Seahawks defense against the chargers offense, a couple quick things. So first, let's hear from our sponsors and we're going to start with talking about Dodo coffee. If you go to Dodo coffee.co through this weekend, limited time use code Hawk blogger 12 you get 12% off not only your coffee and your merch got my hat here which I love. But you also may get a Cooper Cup signed football with your delivery. It's just going to come to somebody who makes that order. You have to use code Hawk blogger 12 you have to do it by this weekend and Isaiah will send you a Cooper Cup signed football. So Dodo coffee.co you can go to simply Seattle.com use code Hawk blogger 15 for 15% off there. Favorite Seahawks mariners Huskies gears all there at simply Seattle.com.

36:27Prize picks download the latest prize picks app in the links in the description of the video use code HMA new users can play $5 get $150 in bonus lineups if you win over at prize picks. And then I think I think that'll do it for listening to our sponsors at least for today. So thanks to our sponsors and thank you for supporting our sponsors. One thing that I did want to highlight for all you guys. So let's do this. New Hawk blogger.com and what we've got today. So today we'll start showing some of those matchup graphics. You've got obviously we're doing first look right now. But the HP daily is live.

37:30And this this event with Graham Grant Cohen is next Saturday. So before the 49ers game we're going to be at lowlander brewing. Make sure you get tickets while they last. This is going to be a lot of fun. You can meet Grant meet myself. Have some fun down at lowlander and preview. It's going to be a great game. But also what you're going to see on Hawk blogger.com today and starting is you know that value over replacements that I showed you that big chart. I'm going to start having risers and followers from the Seahawks any given week. So who made the biggest jump this week? Byron Murphy, DeMarcus Lawrence, Jalen Sandell, made some really big jumps this week, which is cool to see. Ablukus.jsn interestingly. And Josh Job went the wrong way this week. Curious about why, but I don't have the answers. I can look into that later. Also, I've got the top 20 stuff here. So you want to see this is based off of matchups against different players. You can see the top 20 cornerbacks by coverage. It's top 20 safeties, top 20 linebackers by coverage.

38:36The best receivers in the NFL so far this year. Best pass rushers, edge rushers, interior defensive linemen, pass protectors, offensive tackles, and interior offensive linemen run defense and run blocking all up there. So you guys can prove that stuff. If you're looking at HB daily, today's issue. So the Wednesday issues are going to have a look at these offense. I'd look at the opponent. And so one of the things that I wanted to share with you guys here that was in HB daily. So chargers have made the biggest jump in motion of any team in the NFL with Mike McDaniel as their offensive coordinator. But so 78% of the time they're in motion on offense. But it hasn't worked. Chargers negative 0.275 EPA per play when they're in motion. That's the worst of any offense in the NFL. So if you see someone in motion for the chargers, sit back, take a

39:41sip of your beer because it's probably going to be a good play for the sea ox. So it's kind of crazy to think they're in motion more often than, you know, almost any team, third most team in motion and the worst team in the NFL when in motion. So not good. There's also this blitz piece for, I think this is a really important one that came in HB daily today. So the chargers are like the sea ox. Again, it's a Mike McDonald style of defense. And while the sea hawks have faced a blitz, 42% of the time this year, which is way above the average of 30% of what the NFL team see. They've been absolutely destroying the blitz. They are plus 0.48 EPA per drop acts against the blitz. So that's really good. But the chargers, the chargers don't blitz. They've only blitz 25% of the

40:45time. I don't think that you're going to change that this week. It's just a philosophy there. And the interesting thing there is though, their pressure rate, you know, when the chargers blitz, it's a 42% pressure rate. When they don't blitz, it's a 38% pressure rate. So they are slightly above average in creating pressure without blitzing. They are pretty well below average when they do blitz about creating pressure. So I think this is another place to keep an eye on. Obviously, we talked about where the ground game, there's a bunch of stuff in HB daily. And again, you can see all of this every day in your inbox six in the morning. If you want, just sign up here. It's free. And I think I've been enjoying it. I'm getting a lot of use used out of it as well as I'm doing this stuff. And it'll change each day of the week for what's most appropriate for us to be talking about. You'll also notice new thing that I think a lot of folks were interested in. I'll get back the

41:48preview in just a second. I have added something. I don't know if other people have had this. Based on response, I think a lot of people have had this problem. But whenever I'm looking for Seahawks gear, it's so annoying. Like I never, like they advertise the stuff that I don't care about. So I decided to try to solve that for myself. And if you guys want to take advantage, you can. I have this, this is, I think this is brand new. I don't know if anyone else has done this. So the things I look for when I'm looking for for a jersey are one I like throwbacks the best. So I want to be able to see those. But I also like other specific jersey types. But I want to see new players. So now I've got this thing where it will look up into my code and my data. Who are the rookies? Who are free agent additions? So if you want to see the Giddarian price jerseys, the Bo Stevens jerseys and Emmanuel Wilson jerseys, a Julian Neal jersey, Bud Clark, like it's easy to find now. Like I always found that annoying that I had to like dig to find that. But now it's right there for you if you just want to see the new players.

42:51And this is kind of cool. I think it's a geeky thing. But you know that value of a replacement thing that I showed you that's grading every player in the NFL and every Seahawks? Well, wouldn't it be cool if you could shop by who's playing well? Like if someone's playing well, the system should already know that people are going to want like if all of a sudden like Julian loves having a great year, you should be able to find his gear a little bit easier. And so this is literally tied into my own data to promote, you know, players that are playing the best. And if I want to just see men's stuff because I'm not looking for women's stuff, I can do that. You can also shop by player across like jerseys and other paraphernalia. So I want to see Cooper Cups, Sam Darnold, Nicky Benwari is criminally underrepresented in gear. I don't understand why there's such little Nicki Benwari year. Devin Witherspoon, Jadarian Price, AJ Barner, whatever. And I'll expand this over time. But I think it's pretty innovative. I'm pretty excited about it. And you can see it both as, you know, this normal page with some of

43:56the stuff that I've picked or you can go into this grid view. And, you know, again, go across different categories if you want to see hoodies. You know, there's specific size that you want. There's a specific style. You just want throwback stuff. You just want Super Bowl gear. So anyway, if you're interested, it's up there on hawkbarga.com slash gear. Or you can just go to hawkbarga.com and click gear in the top right. So I'm going to use it. I thought you guys might be interested and want to use it as well. Okay. So let's get back to looking at the chargers. All right. So where do I want to go next? Well, let's go back to this. Let's go back to the graphic here because I think we're going to look at where there's some advantages where there are not. Okay.

44:59So this is when the Seahawks, this is, wait, all right, all the way to the way top. What's going on here? We already did all this offensive stuff. We already did this. Let's get to defense. So when the chargers have the ball, this has been a disaster for the chargers. I mean, Mike McDaniel supposed to be an offensive whiz Justin Herbert supposed to be like wonderkin at quarterback. It has just been a disaster. And if you look at these numbers, 29th and points per game, they're averaging under 15 points per game. They had five turnovers, five takeaways. They scored 16 points. They had five takeaways and they scored 16 points. That is insane. Like I honestly don't even understand. I watched the game. I still don't understand how you can have five turnovers in 16 points. Their EPA per play is second to worst in the NFL. Success rate 23rd, explosive play rate 16,

46:03turnovers 26th, DVOA 26th. It's just, it's not good. Now the rush offense is maybe their best part. Their 11th and DVOA rush offense, but the C-Hogs running defense is the best thing they've got going. The only team worse than the C-Hogs in 11 personnel, I think, I think this is right, is the chargers. They're dead last when they have three receivers out there. They're pretty good with their fullback. Allick and gold is the 21 personnel. That's the second most commonly used personnel grouping for them. Their ninth and EPA per play on that. It's still a negative number. But like their ninth overall, C-Hogs have done relatively well defending that, but it is their worst personnel grouping to defend so far. Their 14th and defending it. Past defense, I mean, let's get into the pressure rate stuff because I think this really matters. Chargers 29th in the NFL

47:06and pressure rate allowed. 13th in the NFL in time to pressure. That's not terrible. 25th in the NFL and sacrate. One of the things to keep an eye on with this offense though that makes me a little uneasy is that Justin Herbert will run. He's not Josh Allen, but they will run cubi sweeps with Justin Herbert. He will take off on the ground. He is a good runner. So I think when he's under pressure, his ability to escape and we've seen this, the C-Hogs have had trouble getting guys on the ground. They are very powerful defensive line. They are not the fastest defensive line. And so we've seen it with a Chen and a Wosu. We've seen it with DeMarcus Lawrence and Byron Murphy and Leonard Williams. Like it's one thing to get close to the quarterback. It's another thing to be able to chase him down. And Dante Fowler is supposed to be your speed guy. Has not shown up yet.

48:07Now this is really damning. This is really damning. The Chargers and Justin Herbert, EPA from a clean pocket, meaning he's not being pressured. 30th in the NFL. So even when they're not under pressure, they still suck. That is damning as a passing offense to be that bad when you are not under pressure. In fact, they're not better statistically. Their EPA is lower when they're under pressure, which is the case with pretty much everybody. But relative to the rest of the NFL, they're better when they're under pressure. They're giving up a lot of quick pressures. And under 2.5 seconds, 26th in the NFL and that. Keep in mind, again, these numbers we already talked about this week. Seahawks are fourth in the NFL in creating quick pressures. Even though it doesn't feel like it, that's what the data sets. And then I mean, Chargers are 28th in the NFL and going against the nickel

49:10passing. That's what they're going to get a lot of that from the Seahawks. So it's like a the offense does not match up well for the Chargers. They've been 27th in against man coverage, 28th against zone coverage. So they're like, they're like just bad against everything so far. It's just it's a really, it's not a pretty picture for Mike McDaniel. Like it's almost he might get fired before the season ends kind of bad if it keeps up at this level. Now, similar to the Seahawks, they like to spam outrouched their fifth in the NFL in how often they run out for out. So they're third in the NFL in EPA per target when they run out routes. This is a big one to keep in mind because the 30th the Seahawks are the 30th ranked team in defending out routes. This has been a problem for the Seahawks this year. 30th in the NFL in this particular route. This shouldn't be because the Seahawks defend and offense every week in practice that runs these

50:14out routes. But so far they have not been good at covering these. So keep an eye on that. Are you going to get some outbreaking routes? How are the Seahawks going to handle that against the Chargers? It is this is the first team we've seen that runs a lot of go routes. So they're 12th in terms of how often they'll run the go the deep route. They're not very good when they do it. They're second to worst in the NFL targeting it and the Seahawks are fourth in defending it. So I don't know, but that's just another thing to keep an eye on. They do like to go deep. They haven't been very good at it. Quinn Johnson's been bad. Trey Harris has been okay. Ladna Conkey is a really good route runner. You know, he's a good receiver. I think Alec Engold, you know, they see stab him as ninth like he has been I think very good. They don't have a tight end to really go after they've not been doing the screen game very much. Seahawks have not been good at defending screens. Second to last in the NFL and defending screens. Gotta get better at that. Run defense.

51:19I mean, it's ugly. It's ugly for the Chargers. Seahawks are number one in the NFL in Russian success rate against second and EPA per rush. Third and explosive run rate. The Rush DVOA is third power success. Fourth stuffed rate. Third. I mean, it's just not a pretty picture for the Chargers run game. So you kind of want the Chargers to try to run the ball, even though their past game has not been good either. From a stylistic perspective, the Chargers on offense. Like we said, a lot of motion, but the worst in the NFL when they run it. The Seahawks are second in the NFL and defending plays with motion. They've been really good at handling this. Play action. Chargers are 11th, but the Seahawks are 9th in defending it. The screen game is the one to keep an eye on, but the Chargers don't do it very often. Now, run game style. You know, there's just nothing that the Chargers do very good. There's a pull lead that they do that their 15th in the NFL,

52:23but the Seahawks are 9th in defending it. So I mean, like it's an ugly picture on the ground for the Chargers. And then when you get to special teams, it's also mostly advantage Seahawks. Now, the Chargers are pretty good punt return team. 11th in the NFL. The kick return game. This is one to watch. Chargers have some good kick return in their in their bag. And the Seahawks are third to worst in defending and covering kicks right now. It's not good. So that's something to keep an eye on because I think field position was a part of how the Seahawks lost this game against the commanders. You don't want to see that happen a second time this week. So when you kind of step back and look at all this together, you know, the Chargers are going to be the proverbial

53:25desperate team back into a corner. 0 and 3. They can't lose again. Their season will be over. The coaches are feeling urgency. The players are feeling urgency. They had a chance to win. They didn't beat Buffalo Buffalo is maybe the in some people's eyes, the Super Bowl favorite in Buffalo. They they had that game. They were ahead in the fourth quarter. So they're going to come in feeling like, all right, we're we're getting better. We can stand up toe to toe with anybody. I don't think they're going to leave that game feeling like they're not a good football team. I think they're going to feel like they can play anybody and they just need to finish. The Seahawks. You know what? Like, yes, they're coming off a loss. I don't feel like I've gotten an impression that Seahawks feel feel like that loss changed their perspective at all. Nor really should it. But I don't feel like the Seahawks are like super pissed off about what happened. There's

54:28been a little bit of talk about it. But I think you'll hear that they're mostly probably I think it's a little bit of a fluke what happened and they just need to be themselves. So just from a motivation perspective, for whatever that's worth, I think the chargers have a little bit of an edge there. I think that the thing that would concern me the most is just in Herbert has not been good yet. If he gets hot and all of a sudden he's making good decisions and making good throws, he can be really tough to defend. He can beat you with his legs. He can make throws like Matt Stafford. He can make throws that nobody else can make and you can play really good defense and he can still get after you. So one of the things that I'm curious about and I'm starting to kind of try to keep an eye on is if the Seahawks pass rush is one of the best and quick pressures getting pressure on the quarterback, not so much sacking them but getting pressure. And they're still struggling. Then it starts pointing the finger at coverage, right?

55:29And so Russian coverage worked together. And if the past rush was essentially doing really well against the commanders by the numbers, then it really indicates that the coverage did not do really well to allow Marcus Mariotta to get productive passes either went under pressure or really, really rapidly. You should be able to cover somebody for 2.3 seconds. I think that's the thing to watch. Now the fact that the chargers don't have their tight end, the fact that they're missing a lot of their offensive line, the fact that the offensive line that they do have healthy have not been playing their best. That does bowed well for Seattle. The fact that the chargers have struggled to run the ball, it's kind of curious, Amari and Hampton and Keaton Mitchell, I think is a really interesting good running back duo. One's got speed, one's got power. I think the offensive lines contributing to why that's not working.

56:34I think the receivers for them are not great. Other than I think Lad Mkonki is very good. The C-Ox should be the favored team here and they are. But this is not a game where you can look at a winless 0-3 team and a team that has terrible statistics across the board on offense and feel safe. I don't think that's this game. You might think that that's a reaction to last week where I was like, there's no reason the C-Ox should lose. Maybe I'm just like the C-Ox. There's nothing that happened this weekend that changes my opinion about my analysis of the game going into it. The C-Ox had no reason to lose that game. They were significantly better than the commanders on both sides of the ball, more talented. They lost. This week, I'm just telling you what I see. I see a better team than the commanders that's going to be just as desperate and just as motivated.

57:35And the C-Ox are going to have to play good football to win. I don't think this is a game where you can have three turnovers, no takeaways, and be within two points. I don't think it's going to be like that kind of game. I think you're going to have to protect the football. I think you're going to have to score points. I think that the rough feel here is, I mean, 25 points, like would be something where you're feeling okay. It's going to be hard to score 25 points against this team. I think 20 points you'd like to think that the C-Ox defense can hold the chargers down below that. There's no guarantee. So I think that's kind of going to be the game. First to 24 points, probably feels pretty good about their chances. But we'll see. We will see. So a couple things. We will have Real Hawk Talk tonight at 5 o'clock. We will have locker room interviews get posted.

58:37We'll have press conference stuff today. A lot of info come in. Make sure you check out at HawkBurger.com. All the stuff. There'll be more data showing. There'll be a lot of things going up there. You can explore for yourself and you can get access to HP Daily free. You can get today's issue. You can get yesterday's issue. You can also subscribe if you'd like to get it delivered to your inbox. I'd love to hear from folks. If you have feedback thoughts, people can give me feedback. I'm trying to make some changes to respond to what people find useful or not. And also make changes on the website as well. So I think that will do it for my side. Let's check out Superchats. We've got a foam finger here from Hawk Maniac. Thank you for that. Let me check out Venmo Superchats. Venmo.com slash Brian Dash. NEMHOWSER. Always appreciate folks doing this. Just another plug. Make sure you go to

59:41HawkBurger.com slash event to buy tickets to our Vegas show. It'll be really fun with Evan and Jeff. Make sure you go to HawkBurger.com slash lowlander. L-O-W-L-A-N-D-E-R to get tickets to our show against the 49ers with Grant Cohen at lowlander brewing. A couple of Superchats here on Venmo. Joel Federman says, what was left after the buyer paid the service fee? Thank you for this site. I don't know what I'm responding to there, Joel. I'm sorry. Sorry, Joel. I don't understand. Maybe this is an HPTX related thing, but I need more information. If you want to send me an email, you don't have to spend another Superchats, but just shoot me note and explain what you're after. Jacob Henry, a nice HPTX tip for selling his tickets up there. I appreciate that. As you guys know, I don't charge any fees. I do want to remind folks, 49ers are coming the week after this one. They're buying up tickets. They're feeling very good about their team. They're going to have a lot of red in that stadium. Use HPTX. List your tickets there.

1:00:46Tell people about it. Let's get tickets in Seahawks fans hands. Use HPTX. At least list your tickets to give Seahawks fans a chance to buy them. Garyc Danielson, on price fumbles, did I impress you? Daniel Thomas had a fumbling issue as a rookie that he's able to resolve. It was 7-8 in his rookie year. I disagree with Nathan who said after our post game show that fumbling is not something that really gets solved. There's examples on both sides. I don't think it's conclusive one way or another. Tiki Barber was a fumble or he didn't fumble as much. There's guys that have been fumbles that stop being fumbles. You mentioned Lydany and Tom Linson. But your Ryan Price has got work to do. Let's see. Let's see if he has a great game this week. I think it's a really important game for your Ryan Price. I really, really do. All right. That will do it for this episode of Hockback Warnings. Take care and see you later today.