We are two games into this early portion of the 2024 NFL season, and there is national buzz building around our beloved Seattle Seahawks. Bucky Brooks and Colin Cowherd both have the team solidly inside their top ten. NFL Network analyst Pete Schrager has been high on them all throughout the preseason, and has picked Mike Macdonald as his favorite to win coach of the year honors. Bill Simmons has them as his sixth best team right now.

To be clear, the Seahawks have only played two games, and have beaten two other teams who don’t project to be contenders (although, I think the Patriots could prove to be a tough out this year). Still, as it stands right now, Seattle is one of the top DVOA performing teams through two games. They are explosive on offense, and they are playmaking on defense.

They will also be the first to say that they haven’t played anything close to their best ball yet. On the flight home from New England, Mike Macdonald was so pissed off at the way his defense gave up yards on the ground, that he had to stream The Last Kingdom on Netflix to get out of his head. When asked the following day what this team could do to better get the run game going, he plainly, and somewhat coldly said get better push up from.

Mike Macdonald is not going to sugar coat things like Pete Carroll sometimes would. He’s careful not to blame players, and he pointed to his on chest when pressed about his team’s run defense against the Pats, but he is very careful to not offer too much praise on players when there was clearly things he believes they could do better. His messaging often revolving around the term “chasing the edges.”

His coaching style is almost solely focused on the mission of constantly getting better. He wants to get the best out of his players, and will not likely put into words anything to suggest that he is satisfied with all aspects of his team after a win. Nor should he.

Despite the 2-0 start (first time in franchise history a new coach has ever done this), the supportive DVOA analytics, this team’s offensive line is currently graded out as one of the worst performing units in the league. Simply put, it is tough to imagine Seattle being a true contender for the NFC West division title with this low level of offensive line play, if it continues to stay this course.

This is why ESPN has labeled Seattle pretenders this week, and probably why Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk has them as his 21st best team. While Florio seems to be one of the few remaining Geno Smith critics (and an occasion troll of Seahawk fans), if he has placed Seattle at 21 based on their offensive line play, I get it.

The Seattle Seahawks need their offensive line to settle in right now. While the Tua Tagovailoa-less Miami Dolphins might feel like an easy win for Seattle coming up this Sunday, they will not be, if Seattle cannot get their run blocking and pass protection playing better.

The glass half full outlook is that they certainly can play better because the truth of the matter is that they can’t play much worse. A deeper look at the state of their offensive line supports this idea.

When Seattle walked into Gillette Stadium last Sunday, they were down to their third string right tackle, they had an unsettled situation at right guard between Anthony Bradford, and rookie Christian Haynes, and their brand new starting center, Connor Williams, had only been practicing for a few weeks after tearing his ACL in his knee last December. On top of that, their new left guard, Laken Tomlinson, hadn’t exactly been impressing. It’s hard to imagine an offensive line like this going up against one of the better front sevens in the league having a great game. At best, you just want to feel like they did okay. It is very wishful thinking, though.

When you look at the current state of Seattle’s offensive line, and them examine what Geno Smith has been able to accomplish over the last couple weeks, no fan should be nervous if Seattle offers up a brand new contract extension his way. He has been playing top quarterback play despite the present shambolic state of his offensive line.

Herein lies some silver linings, though, and reasons why Seattle fans can actually be a bit optimistic Seattle can carry forth as a contender this year.

Through two games, left tackle Charles Cross has been one of the best performing left tackles in the league. It is foundational for any team to have their left tackle play at this elite level. Premium position players playing elite is exactly what teams need to succeed.

Connor Williams, while new to this team, was one of the top performing centers last year. It is reasonable to assume that he will settle more into Seattle’s offensive line, and get the players around him to play better ball. In fact, this week, Coach Macdonald noted that he took a big step forward against New England. If Connor stays healthy, I trust that much better ball lays ahead for him and the interior fellas this year. Top centers make those around them play better.

Another potential huge positive for this offensive line is eventually getting Abe Lucas back at right tackle, or at the very least, George Fant getting healthy enough to settle back in. Fant is one of the very top reserves in the league, and when healthy, is a very capable starter. Abe Lucas still has the talent to be one of the very best right tackles in the game. Either one of these guys back is going to help this offensive line. There is reason for optimism this will happen soon enough.

The biggest issue remaining with this unit remains the situation at guard. The hope is that one owns the right guard spot, and then the other pushes Tomlinson at left guard. Haynes likely has the much higher upside, his run blocking appears more promising, but his pass protection remains a work in progress. That is probably why the coaches prefer Bradford right now, and maybe he settles further into the right guard spot, and Haynes starts to make a push at left guard.

It will be interesting to see over the course of the next few weeks just how much settled in the interior of the offensive line becomes. I have some optimism that it will, but if things continue being an issue, Seattle has juggled funds around in 2024 by restructuring DK Metcalf’s contract to open up an additional $9 million in cap space. With John Schneider’s track record of mid season trading, it wouldn’t surprise me if we see them acquire an established guard from another team.

Who this person could be, I have no idea, but last year at this time, I didn’t exactly have a read on them eventually trading for defensive tackle Leonard Williams, either. The hope might be to see if these new pieces inside grow together through the next three games, but the reality might be them itching to make a deal sometime in October, if they are still in serous contention for the division, but don’t feel secure enough at guard.

Outside of the interior of the offensive line, the only other areas on this team where depth makes me nervous still is middle linebacker, and running back.

At linebacker, I love Tyrel Dobson and Jerome Baker’s potential together, but Baker’s hamstring issue makes me nervous, and while I like the potential in Tyrice Knight, his inexperience and the lack of depth behind him make me even more nervous. I would not mind seeing this team acquire another proven journeyman middle linebacker to rotate in with these guys. Who knows, if that will happen. They might see injuries to starters as a way to get unproven players playing time, and growth.

At running back, I am head over heels in love with K9, but I worry about his ability to stay healthy enough. I also think his backup, Zach Charbonnet is a really different style player who might not fit Grubb’s offensive to the degree K9 does, and they will have to adjust whenever he gets meaningful carries. I wonder if they need to acquire another back who is more or less a closer version to K9 for this offense to maintain its consistency whenever they have to lean into the run game. Time will tell if this is a warranted concern, or not.

On the whole, however, this team is showing tons of promise within position groups that you want promise to be shown. This is probably the biggest reason why they can indeed be contenders this year, if the offensive line as just settle down, and play better enough to be closer to the middle of the pack of offensive lines.

This defensive line and edge rush group is proving to be DEEEEEEEEP, and that is a really good thing moving forward. It also appears that with Riq Woolen, and Devin Witherspoon, they may possess the best cornerback tandem in the league. If your goal is to build a top flight defense, the two areas you most want to be strong at is defensive line and corner.

Offensively, they have a veteran quarterback who looks to be ready to have a very promising season, and he has weapons galore to throw at. DK Metcalf, Jaxon Smith Njigba, Tyler Lockett, Noah Fant, and possibly Jake Bobo could all have big seasons this year. This quarterback paired with this group could be as good, if not better than any in this league this year. The potential is that big.

On top of all of this, bad fortune for other teams within the NFC West division could prove fruitful for Seattle to stay atop this division, if they can figure out the best version of themselves. The Los Angeles Rams are battered up on their offensive line and within their star receiving corps. The San Francisco 49ers are now without their two best offensive weapons in Christian McCaffrey, and Deebo Samuel. In Arizona, Kyler Murray has shown to be injury prone. If Seattle wins this division, on top of getting big years out of key players, it could be a situation where they just simply win the battle of attrition.

Will this happen?

I dunno, but I will say that I feel more confident about the Seahawks competing with the 49ers than I have over the past few years. At the very least, I think they can be a much tougher out than in previous years. With new coaches comes fresh perspectives and schemes that opponents like San Francisco might be more unsure how to prepare for. When you add this to the talent that Seattle has been amassing over the past few years, it wouldn’t surprise me if we see a shakeup within the rivalries in this division in favor of the Seahawks.

But I think it is also way too early to label them a true contender right now. We need more games to be played. We need to see if they can get past Miami, pull an upset in Detroit, and then hand it to the Giants before we can feel super confident in that first matchup against San Fran.

Because the truth of the matter is that, like it or not, San Francisco is a supremely talented team who has been there, and done that for several years now, and they are what Seattle is trying to become, and ultimately overtake. This might take time.

But in that, judging off these past two games, I really like what Seattle is showing us so far. I love it, in fact.

Go Hawks.