It was only pre-season but the Seahawks weren’t about to lose in front of their home crowd on their pre-season opener – they came out with a strong offense and dominated the San Diego Chargers 41-14 under the Friday night lights of Centurylink Field.
It was the first time the Seahawks had taken their home field since hoisting the Lombardi trophy in New Jersey in February and the team was ready to give their hometown crowd a show.
Seahawks beat Chargers at pre-season home opener
Quarterback, Russell Wilson and his offense were spot on. Russell was near perfect completing 11 out of 13 passes – one of the two missed passes was to receiver Doug Baldwin was complete but Baldwin was slammed out of bounds putting a null and void on what would have been a touchdown.
Russell showed his hustle, throwing for 121 yards, running another 31 yards and holding onto the ball to score two touchdowns.
The first half of the game even had Marshawn Lynch in for two plays before handing things over to Robert Turbin and Cristine Michael.
Turbin showed his stuff with 12 carries and 81 yards including a one-yard touchdown and some lightening speed during a 47-yard run.
Seahawk hopeful, Tyrell Pryor got a lot of playing time after Wilson took to the bench. Although it’s most likely that Tavaris Jackson will be Wilson’s backup – Seattle has been impressed by Pryor and looking closely at him to see what he can do. Pryor showed that like Wilson, he’s not afraid to run the ball himself and ran past San Diego’s defense for a 44-yard touchdown in the 4th quarter. Pryor ended up with two touchdowns.
The “aw shucks” moment of the game came during the third quarter. It appeared Tharold Simon was going to redeem himself for last week’s ejection for throwing a punch during the game against the Broncos by getting a 105-yard pick six. Unfortunately, after the cornerback ran for 105 yards to the cheers of 67,000 Seahawk fans, the refs called illegal contact against Simon leaving him without any breath and without his touchdown.
Simon was selected by the Seahawks during the fifth round in 2013, and is fighting for a spot on the53-man roster for the Hawks.
The call was questionable but proof that the league means business when it comes to overly physical play by defenders. After Friday night’s game, Safety Earl Thomas referred to the new rule as the “Legion of Boom” rule referring to the talk that Seattle’s secondary has had a lot to do with the stricter officiating.
For the most part, Seattle had a vast improvement in the number of penalties called against them compared to the week before in Denver.
The Seahawks, who haven’t seemed to let a Super Bowl win go to their heads, now look forward to next week when the Chicago Bears come to town. The Bears are coming off a 20-19 win against the Jacksonville Jaguars and their matchup against this Seahawks promises to be physical. Seattle will take it’s week by week mentality to the field and look forward to going 1-0 once again.
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