Seahawks notebook: Wilson entering conversation for NFL’s MVP
Published 5:17 pm Tuesday, November 22, 2016
RENTON — Russell Wilson is undoubtedly the most valuable Seahawk. Just looked at what the offense was when he was hurt in September and October. Better yet, close your eyes.
He could become the most valuable man in Seattle. That is, if the newest investor in the city’s effort to build a new south-of-downtown arena and attract the return of the NBA succeeds.
“SODO arena. Make it happen,” the quarterback said to end his postgame comments on Sunday.
But should Wilson, impressive playing through a sprained ankle and knee and sublime in his last three games in his return to health, become the most valuable player in all the NFL?
His No. 1 receiver and touchdown maker — the man who threw Wilson a TD pass last weekend to help beat Philadelphia — thinks so.
“If he’s not, I don’t know who else would be ahead of him right now,” Doug Baldwin said after Wilson’s third consecutive game and fourth this season with at least 270 yards passing, at least one touchdown pass and no interceptions.
How about Dak?
“Who?” Baldwin said, his voice rising.
Dak Prescott, the wondrous rookie QB that has led Dallas to 9-1. Or Derek Carr, the deep-throwing quarterback of the 8-2 Oakland Raiders?
“I guess,” Baldwin spat back, almost scoffing. “I guess.
“I mean, I don’t know is playing better than him right now. He’s the best player in the league right now. By far.”
Of course Baldwin is biased. Wilson is the man that enabled him to set a Seahawks record last season with 14 touchdown catches and is why Baldwin has six this season. Wilson’s four previous years of excellence while Seattle went to two Super Bowls and won one helped Baldwin became a $46 million man this spring.
But is Baldwin right?
The first criteria for whether a player is “most valuable” is — at least should be: Does he win?
Wilson has the Seahawks at 7-2-1 entering Sunday’s game at Tampa Bay (5-5). That’s the second-best record in the NFC to … Prescott’s and rookie wonder running back Ezekiel Elliott’s Cowboys.
Carr’s Raiders lead the AFC West and are tied with Tom Brady and the New England Patriots for the AFC’s best record. As great as Drew Brees still is for New Orleans, leading the league with 26 touchdown passes and a 71-percent completion rate, his defensively deficient Saints are 4-6.
But one of those four wins was against Wilson’s Seahawks last month. That was the Oct. 30 game from which on the team’s flight home Wilson and Seattle coach Pete Carroll agreed to ditch the conservative play calling that had been protecting Wilson’s injuries and turn the QB loose again to make the scrambling, improvisational, improbable plays that only he in the league can make.
Such as last weekend’s twisting throw across his body on the run at the line of scrimmage for a scrambling touchdown pass to Jimmy Graham.
A second criterion is the most obvious one: straight statistics.
Wilson’s 2,714 yards passing through 10 games has him on pace to break by more than 300 yards the Seahawks’ record for a single season he set for 2015.
Brady will get MVP consideration and votes because, one, he’s Tom Brady, but also because at age 39 his numbers are as good or better than they’ve ever been. He has 16 touchdowns against just one interception, a completion rate of 70.4 percent second only to Brees, a league-best passer rating of 123.3 and a gaudy 9.3 yards per attempt —10.0 yards throw is considered otherworldly.
Brady’s only loss this season? When Wilson out-played him two weeks ago during the Seahawks’ win in Foxborough.
Prescott has seven fewer completions in 19 fewer throws than Wilson, for a better completion percentage of 67.7 to Wilson’s 66. Prescott has 17 touchdown passes and two interceptions to Wilson’s 11 and two. More touchdowns for Prescott explains why his passer rating is 108.6, third in the league, and Wilson is ninth at 99.5.
Carr has thrown it way more than Prescott and Wilson — 385 passes, to 335 for Wilson and 316 for Prescott. With 34 more completions than Wilson he has only 86 more yards. Carr has 20 touchdown passes, tied for fifth in the league, against four interceptions and a passer rating of 100.6 that is sixth in the NFL.
Elliott leads the league in yards rushing (1,102), carries (223) and is third in touchdown runs (nine) and fourth in yards per carry (4.9).
Then there are the factors beyond the numbers. Sustained excellence annually is one. That’s where Brady, Brees and now, in his fifth great season, Wilson separate themselves.
Carr had 52 touchdowns against 17 interceptions the last two seasons. This is his third one in the league since Seattle helped him become a starter as a rookie. Carr shredded the Seahawks’ starting defense in the 2014 exhibition finale, ending a quarterback competition with Matt Schaub that summer in Oakland.
Overcoming challenges to excel is another MVP consideration. Statistics alone don’t define how great — how “valuable” — a player is.
Brady spent his four-game suspension from the league for his role in the DelfateGate ball-inflation fiasco.
Prescott was a fourth-round draft pick preparing to be Tony Romo’s backup for years, until Cliff Avril broke a bone in Romo’s back on a sack early in the third preseason game on Aug. 25. Prescott has been brilliant since Week 1, and the Cowboys are now thought to be trading Romo eventually.
Wilson has been at even semi-good health for just 3½ of his 10 games. Yet he just keeps playing — and winning. He is still wearing a brace on the left knee where he sprained the medial collateral ligament on Sept. 25 against San Francisco. Coaches and trainers tried to talk him into sitting out multiple games after that injury, saying it should have sidelined him four weeks. He still hasn’t missed a practice.
“No chance,” the league record holder for most quarterback wins in his first four seasons said.
Beginning Thursday when Dallas hosts Washington in its annual Thanksgiving home game, Prescott and Elliott are entering unknowns. A large part of this admittedly premature MVP talk will center on those new Cowboys stars being rookies. They’ve never before been part of an NFL playoff push as Dallas enters December.
How they perform then will largely determine whether one of them becomes league MVP — or whether Baldwin proves to be right all along about Wilson being the most valuable not just in Seattle but beyond.
Webb waived
The obvious that the Seahawks had dropped J’Marcus Webb from their plans is now official in the plainest way: They dropped him from their team.
Tuesday’s official NFL transactions showed Seattle waived its highest-paid offensive lineman. The move came two days after the Seahawks left the 28-year-old veteran of seven seasons inactive despite him being healthy to at least back up at the battered tackle position for the win over Philadelphia.
The team eats the remainder of the $2.45 million, two-year contract to which it signed Webb in March.
Webb had started all 16 games last season for Oakland, mostly at guard and some at tackle.
The Chicago Bears’ starting left tackle in the 2011 and ‘12 seasons seemed destined to be the Seahawks’ starting right tackle to begin this season. That’s where Seattle had him into training camp. Then he injured his knee in August. Garry Gilliam, who spent the offseason readying to replace departed free agent Russell Okung, moved back to right tackle to replace Webb for the final preseason games. Bradley Sowell became the left tackle to begin this season.
Webb did start three games in September at right guard, after top rookie draft choice Germain Ifedi got a high-ankle sprain just before the opener.
Gilliam is still starting at right tackle through 10 games. Sowell got hurt at Arizona Oct. 23. The Seahawks chose undrafted college basketball player George Fant over Webb to replace Sowell for the rest of that overtime tie against the Cardinals. Fant has started the four games since, with Webb mothballed. When Fant injured his shoulder and missed part of last weekend’s win over the Eagles, rookie draft choice Rees Odhiambo replaced Fant at left tackle. Webb stayed in sweat clothes on the sideline, inactive.
All that adds to the belief of Seahawks veteran line coach Tom Cable, coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider not to spend much on blockers in today’s NFL, which offensive linemen enter unprepared after years playing standing up in college spread offenses. Seattle has the lowest-paid offensive line in the league.
Tuesday, it got lower — though Webb will still be cashing checks from the Seahawks.
