Seahawks have some work to do
SEATTLE – Kelly Jennings initially offered a routine, bland answer when asked how his first NFL game went, as if he had played 100 pro football games.
“It went all right,” Jennings said late Saturday after he was part of the Seahawks’ sloppy, 13-3 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in their exhibition opener. “I’ve got some stuff I need to work on.”
But his tone of voice suggested more. Then Seattle’s No. 1 draft choice began sounding like the early college graduate and owner of two degrees that he is.
He also sounded like the rookie the Cowboys burned four times for 79 yards passing in the second and third quarters. Receivers repeatedly sprinted down the sidelines, stopped and then turned behind Jennings to catch intentionally underthrown balls from Dallas quarterback Tony Romo.
“I’ve got to work on the underthrown fade route,” Jennings said, peeling off the veneer. “Instead of turning into the ball, I need to turn into the receiver and then find the ball, go through the man to get to the ball.”
Jennings, battling veteran Kelly Herndon for the starting left cornerback job, said he never saw such trickery while playing at the University of Miami.
“In college, if you get the fade route, you don’t get the receiver stopping,” he said. “It’s just a race out to the ball.
“It’s something I’ve got to work on.”
Sure, it was just one, fake game, with three more to go before they get real Sept. 10 in Detroit. But Jennings’ realization is just one of many aspects of Saturday’s loss that the newly enlightened Seahawks will be working on in training camp before the next game, Sunday at Indianapolis.
The defending NFC champions will be working on their entire offense. Last season’s NFL leaders in scoring managed three points and 56 yards on 14 plays Sunday before the starting backs and receivers left after two drives. They also had three penalties – two on receivers Bobby Engram and Nate Burleson for false starts.
Of course, that was largely the same Dallas defense that held the Seahawks to three points in the first 58 minutes of Seattle’s 13-10 comeback win last October.
Not that these Seahawks are the same as those – at least not yet.
When asked if Saturday showed the Seahawks are going to have to work harder to approach that level, quarterback Matt Hasselbeck said: “Absolutely. I know it is sloppy in the first preseason game, usually, but that wasn’t us out there. We are a much better team than that.
“I know it is going to be a tough week this week. Our coaches are going to look at that film, and they’re going to be tough on us. And they should be.”
Hasselbeck said his biggest concern was the many missed assignments and the penalties, “stuff that is kind of uncharacteristic of the kind of football we have been playing.”
Coach Mike Holmgren said he was “disappointed” at the sloppiest exhibition opener he could remember in his eight Seattle seasons.
He called backup quarterback Seneca Wallace “one of the few bright spots.”
Wallace, who rarely plays during the regular season, was 11 for 17 for 117 yards passing playing from the second quarter until midway through the fourth. But he was sacked four times from some of those missed assignments Hasselbeck mentioned.
Chris Spencer, the 2005 No. 1 pick, started at left guard for Floyd Womack (hamstring strain). Shaun Alexander ran three times for eight yards to the left, behind Spencer. His longest gain was five yards, on a cutback right.
Spencer was supposed to play center, but the first-team line played the entire first half. Spencer then moved to right guard. He did not play center, something Holmgren has said the backup to Pro Bowl center Robbie Tobeck needs to do.
When asked whether anybody stood out on a defense missing three starters due to injury, Holmgren replied, “They should. They were out there a long time.”
He didn’t offer a name.
“I can deal with physical errors, but the mental stuff really bothered me,” Holmgren said in summarizing this first test. “You can’t be a successful team and have those kind of errors.”