Holmgren at loss

RENTON, Wash. – A passing game that has gone from Space Age to Stone Age. A star quarterback still out indefinitely with the back of an old man.

Bickering on the sidelines. A center snapping the ball at the sound of an audible. Questions over whether it’s already time to play the kids, since the Seahawks haven’t won in a month.

Mike Holmgren hasn’t had a team this bad since he was teaching high school in San Francisco three decades ago.

“It reminds me of when I first started coaching at Sacred Heart High School, you know? We were kind of overmatched all the time, playing against better players for a while,” Seattle’s exhausted-looking coach said Monday. A day earlier, his last-place team skidded to 1-5 with a 20-10 loss at Tampa Bay while again playing without injured quarterback Matt Hasselbeck.

And Hasselbeck may not play this week at San Francisco, either. He hasn’t passed strength tests for his knee, the prerequisite for his return.

Yes, this is how bad it’s gotten for the four-time defending NFC West champions just six games into Holmgren’s 10th and final season as their coach: A veteran team with six Pro Bowl players, Super Bowl aspirations and a 17-year coach who is tied for 10th all-time in wins reminds him of a squad of struggling teenagers.

“They gave you everything they had. And you loved them for it. But it was going to be tough each week,” Holmgren said of those days when he was a coach and high school history teacher.

Hasselbeck’s bulging disk is pressing on a nerve that runs down to his hyperextended right knee, keeping the joint weak. Until he passes the strength tests assigned by doctors, he won’t play.

“That’s going to be on a week-to-week, almost day-to-day basis on what his progress is with his rehab,” Holmgren said. “The last medical report is that he is feeling better each day.”

Holmgren added that if Hasselbeck can’t play again, as seems likely, he isn’t sure whether backup Seneca Wallace or third-stringer Charlie Frye would start against the 49ers, who won 33-30 in overtime at Seattle in Week 2. Wallace made his first start in two years on Sunday night against the Buccaneers and completed 12 of 23 passes, the same numbers Frye had while looking overwhelmed in a loss to Green Bay the week before.

Wallace had just 73 yards passing, Seattle’s lowest total for a game since September 2001. Holmgren barely hid his unhappiness with the veteran backup’s play in his return from a calf injury.

The Seahawks had just one first down and 44 total yards by halftime, when they trailed 17-0 and the game was essentially over. The passing offense is last in the NFL with just 126.8 yards per game.

Part of the problem has been that Seattle has started nine different wide receivers, due to an epidemic of injuries at that position.

There was one good bit of injury news: Pro Bowl linebacker Lofa Tatupu is recovering well from the concussion he suffered Sunday night. He is expected to start at San Francisco.

Not that that’s going to make Holmgren feel any better about his offense. The man who’s remained tied with Hall of Fame coach Joe Gibbs with 171 victories for a month now looked and sounded almost offended by that part of the team.

“The offensive situation is very unusual right now. I’m not quite used to it,” the maestro of the precise West Coast offense said. “And we have to try to figure out the best way to improve this thing — and do it quickly.

“We were 31st (now 32nd) in passing offense. I can’t remember any time when we’ve been much less than 10, and (we’re) usually in the top five. And with the same system.

“It’s just different now.”