For a third straight year the Seattle Seahawks started the season with one of the worst defenses in the NFL. In each of the last two years Seattle was able to right the ship and field a solid unit, so there was legitimate reason for hope they could do so again.
Well here we are near the midpoint of the season, and like clockwork the Seahawks have seemingly gotten back on track. Seattle’s defense has gone from a sieve to suffocating these last three weeks, and safety Quandre Diggs has an explanation.
“I think guys are just comfortable with who we are now,” Diggs elaborated. “We’re understanding things, in coverages we understand where the weakness is, the run game our big guys are going in and penetrating… for us, I think we’re all just comfortable being around each other, understanding everybody’s strengths and understanding what we do best. The coaches have been phenomenal also. They just kinda let us be ourselves. They let us take it by the reigns and let us figure it out.”
Diggs’ assessment of this turnaround being primarily player driven was further backed up by head coach Pete Carroll, who had this to say when asked about the sudden sustained lethality of the pass rush:
“It’s the guys,” Carroll quickly exclaimed. “We (the coaches) adjusted some things, and they embraced it. They have taken off and gone with it. It’s the guys that are doing the job.”
Given the poor quality of defensive play in some of the early games this year, it’s fair to assume there are those out there who didn’t believe in Seattle’s ability to turn it around. However, don’t tell that to the Seahawks defenders.
“I think we’ve always believed from the jump, it was never that we didn’t believe that we were good,” said Diggs. “We knew we were good, we just had to put it together.”
