The Seattle Seahawks struggled during the 2021 season for a lot of reasons. Consistently losing matchups on both sides of the line of scrimmage was one of the biggest ones. As we head towards the 2022 campaign, Pro Football Focus seems to believe those issues will continue.
Yesterday, PFF ranked Seattle’s new-look offensive line as the worst in the leauge. For an encore, they have ranked their remodeled defensive line only No. 29 in the NFL.
“The Seahawks have a few starting-caliber pieces on the interior between Poona Ford, Shelby Harris and Al Woods, but it’s difficult to see where the pressure off the edge is going to come from in 2022. Free-agent acquisition Uchenna Nwosu has a career PFF pass-rushing grade below 70.0, leaving it up to one of Seattle’s young edge rushers such as Darrell Taylor, Alton Robinson or Boye Mafe to lead the way. Taylor is the most likely player to step up. The former Tennessee Volunteer missed his rookie season in 2020 with injury, but he recorded 36 quarterback pressures in a rotational role last year.
A lot will depend on how much Taylor and Robinson develop as they enter their third year in the NFL. However, this still seems like an unnecessarily low ranking for a unit with this much talent.
The interior rotation may not have a superstar but very few teams have a better top-three than Ford, Harris and Woods. On the edge there are question marks but there’s also a lot of young potential. At worst, this group should be considered average compared to other DLs around the league.
