Seahawks’ offensive struggles on the road are hard to explain

An overwhelming home-field advantage and a weak division were enough to make the Seahawks look like contenders.

It was on the road where their warts became visible, the shortcomings that ultimately doomed any thoughts of a deep playoff run.

But enough about the 2007 team.

It’s too soon to say whether the 2016 Seahawks will follow that path, but there are enough parallels to warrant a mention and wonder if Seattle is walking down the same road, so to speak.’

O’Neil: What We Learned from the Seahawks’ lopsided loss in Green Bay

Nine years ago, the Seahawks were two seasons removed from a Super Bowl appearance just as they are now. And back in 2007, they were significantly better at home than they were on the road. They won the home playoff game they earned as the NFC West champions before getting drop-kicked in Green Bay, surrendering 42 unanswered points in a loss in the divisional round.

Sound familiar?

Not just the part about getting blown out in Green Bay, but the discrepancy between the Seahawks’ performances at CenturyLink Field, where they are 6-0 and averaging 28.7 points, and what happens when they go on the road, posting a record of 2-4-1 and scoring an average of 14.6 points.

Back in 2007, it was the defense whose performance wavered based upon the setting. The Seahawks gave up 13.9 points in eight home games, recorded 29 sacks and went 7-1. On the road, Seattle surrendered 22.5 points, had 16 sacks and went 3-5 while losing to such notable opposing quarterbacks as Matt Moore (then with Carolina) and some guy named Chris Redman in Atlanta.

The defensive discrepancy made sense considering the home-field advantage Seattle had built up in one of the league’s loudest stadiums. The decibels curbed the opposing offense’s ability to call out adjustments at the line of scrimmage. The volume was so loud that the offensive tackles couldn’t always hear their quarterback’s cadence, forcing them to take their eyes off the man they were going to block in order to watch the ball.

Given all that, it only made sense that Seattle’s defense had a built-in advantage at home and wasn’t nearly as effective on the road.

There is no intuitive explanation for why Seattle’s offense has hit the skids when it’s gone on the road this year. The Seahawks haven’t played in any stadiums that are considered particularly loud. There’s been no sign that the noise has played a factor in hampering Seattle’s offense, and quarterback Russell Wilson isn’t someone who’s going to blink in the face of a hostile crowd.

It’s hard to make much sense of the struggles to score on the road unless you think that Seattle’s offense runs aground when it plays on grass. That theory was trotted out this week by my esteemed colleague and noted research enthusiast Jim Moore as he pointed out that the Sehawks are 0-3-1 this season on natural grass, having scored a grand total of 24 points in those four games.

It almost makes sense until you realize that the Seahawks are 10-4 in games played on natural grass over the previous three seasons, a record that includes three victories in Arizona in which they averaged 35 points. So unless Seattle suddenly developed some intense allergy to natural grass over the offseason, it’s not the playing surface that explains why the Seahawks scored only six points in Arizona this last time around.

And for all the difficulties Seattle has had on the road this season, the Seahawks’ single most impressive victory occurred there as they scored 31 points in a seven-point win in New England.

Hard to believe that was just last month when the Seahawks went on the road and beat a Patriots team that most consider to be the very best in the league. It was a win that showed that this team is more talented than the 2007 version. Now the Seahawks must find a way to show that down the road.

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