What Geno Smith said about the Seahawks shooting themselves in the foot

The Seattle Seahawks are heading into another matchup with a heavyweight contender. On Sunday they'll visit Santa Clara to face the division rival San Francisco 49ers, who have managed to beat Seattle in six straight meetings, all of them by eight points or more - and most of them qualifying as blowouts. Odds are we are headed for a seventh-straight defeat, and the Niners are heavy home favorites this week (6.5 points).

If the Seahawks are going to buck that trend and pull off an upset, they're going to have to get off to a better start, both in the first quarter and on early downs, where their offense has struggled mightily this season. Here's what starting quarterback Geno Smith had to say yesterday about the Seahawks getting behind schedule on first and second down, according to Mike Dugar at The Athletic.

Geno Smith on Seahawks' problems

"I think we can beat anybody... we have to be a little smarter... we've got to stop shooting ourselves in the foot, stop putting ourselves in backed up situations early on. It's going to be tough in this league playing in third-and-longs; (conversion), percentage rate is not high. The more we can put ourselves in those manageable situations, the better we are. We've been great in the third-and-medium game. Just thinking about first and second down, those are the big things, being better on first and second down, which will help us on third down."

Reading between the lines, Smith is alluding to the team's issues running the ball. Don't you dare go blaming Ken Walker for that problem. Walker is one of the game's most dynamic rushers, but the rushing attack can't get off the ground because of bad blocking by the offensive line, which is just as ineffective in this department as they are in pass protection, and that's saying a lot.

According to the Pro Football Focus team grades, the Seahawks rank 21st in run blocking this year, but ESPN has them ranked 30th in run block win rate - which feels a lot closer to the bullseye. With no lanes to run through, Walker and Zach Charbonnet have consistently been bottled up at or near the line of scrimmage, setting Geno Smith up to get pummelled on those third and longs.

Offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb can help by embracing more misdirection runs, but there's only so much he can do with the pieces he's been given. The return of right tackle Abe Lucas should help some, but realistically, the Seahawks will likely have to upgrade their offensive line personnel before we see any genuine improvement here.

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