Instant impressions from Seahawks blowout win over Cardinals

SEATTLE – Three instant takeaways after the Seahawks thumped the Cardinals 44-22 for their fourth straight victory:

Sam’s club

For a moment, think about what Sam Darnold has done in the first half combined over the past two weeks. He’s 25 of 26 for 349 yards, five touchdowns, zero interceptions and a perfect passer rating of 158.3.

Quite literally, the only mistake he’s made was throwing an incompletion late in the first quarter against Arizona and later fumbling a snap deep in his own end that the Cardinals converted into their only points of the first half.

To be fair, Darnold’s second half was not good. He threw an interception deep in his own territory on a tipped pass early in the third quarter that led to an Arizona touchdown. He also fumbled as he went to throw later in the quarter and only a fourth-down stand kept the Cardinals from capitalizing.

They are turnovers the Seahawks could live with in this circumstance. They’re not turnovers that can be deemed acceptable with some of the games still to come, most notably next week in Los Angeles.

And it would be foolish to think this level of play from the first half the past two games will continue.

D-Law’s returns

We may never see again what happened on Sunday with the combo of Tyrice Knight and DeMarcus Lawrence.

First, consider that only three previous times in NFL history has a player returned two fumbles in the same game for a touchdown and only one of those happened in the last 75 years.

So the fact that Lawrence returned two fumbles for a touchdown in the first half against the Cardinals was a rare piece of NFL history itself. The only others to accomplish that in league history were Carolina’s Jeremy Chinn in 2020 against Minnesota; Fred Evans in 1948 for the Chicago Bears against Washington; and Al Nesser in 1920 for the Akron Pros against the Wheeling Stogies.

Now consider that Knight was responsible for forcing the fumble on Jacoby Brissett both times where Lawrence became the beneficiary. That likely has never happened before.

Those two plays summed up a first half where the Seahawks defensive front just overwhelmed the Cardinals with different looks and different pressures that left Arizona in a constant state of confusion.

JSN’s season

The way Darnold has played in the first half the past two weeks has coincided with Jaxon Smith-Njigba continuing to be on pace for the best season by a wide receiver in Seahawks history.

Smith-Njigba finished with five catches for 93 yards and a 43-yard touchdown Sunday, vaulting him over the 1,000-yard mark for receiving in just nine games. And that’s with Smith-Njigba barely seeing the field in the second half thanks to the blowout score. The Seahawks attempted just two official passes in the second half.

Smith-Njigba now has 1,041 yards receiving on the season. He’s less than 300 yards away from topping the franchise record of 1,303 set by DK Metcalf in 2020.

Everyone knows the ball is going the direction of Smith-Njigba and no one as yet has been able to stop him. It’s a special season that needs to be recognized.