Clayton: Coaching changes will keep Seahawks from getting stale

The Seahawks are getting good reviews for what they did to fix up their coaching staff.

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Defensive coach changes were inevitable. They fired defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. but new DC Clint Hurtt’s plans for the defense as the coordinator have been well-received.

Hurtt wants to be more aggressive. He wants to blitz more than Seattle did last year, including with safety Jamal Adams. He won’t drop defensive linemen into pass coverage. And he is supported with the additions of Sean Desai and Karl Scott as assistants. Good moves.

The surprise from the Seahawks came on offense. No one expected Mike Solari to be fired as the offensive line coach, but the Seahawks promoted Andy Dickerson to the role from run game coordinator so he can work more with offensive coordinator Shane Waldron, who Dickerson came to Seattle from the Rams with prior to last season. That signals the Seahawks are completely following the Los Angeles blocking scheme and running attack.

Overall, the coaching staff – which also added back Sanjay Lal as the offensive passing game coordinator – is younger and will have some different ideas to improve upon last year on offense and defense. That’s a good thing. You don’t want to be stale and do the same thing every year.

The next thing for the Seahawks to figure out is who is going to stay and go among their free agents. They need to add on the offensive line and in the secondary. They have begun talks with free agent safety Quandre Diggs. They have three starters on the offensive line hitting free agency.

Things will get busy.

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