The Seahawks signed D.J. Fluker, and that’s not a surprise. They love kicking the tires on first-round picks who didn’t work out elsewhere – see if they can do a better job of tapping into the talent. And they’re looking to get their running game going, and Fluker might help in that regard – a 340-pounder who can bulldoze people inside.
This is not, however, a particularly noteworthy signing. Fluker was the 11th pick of the 2013 draft, but the Chargers could never get him going. They released him last year. The Giants signed him to a lesser contract and had him in the lineup for six games, but there was no big push there to re-sign him.
Fluker isn’t mobile enough to handle outside pass rushers, so he’s been transitioned to guard. Seattle is hoping for push from him. But it’s very much a speculative signing. This same team, recall, signed Luke Joeckel a year ago. He was the tackle the Jaguars selected 2nd overall in that same Fluker draft, and the Seahawks were unable to get him going at all.
Seattle has Mike Solari coaching the offensive line now. He was with the Giants last year, so he’s worked with Fluker. But an article in the The News Tribune in Tacoma indicates this is a lesser contract and that Fluker hasn’t been promised a starting job. He’s being brought in to compete.
Pete Carroll has identified the running game as the area of the team he would most like to improve. Too often last year running backs were getting blown up in the backfield. With a scrambling quarterback, the team ranked 23rd in rushing, but their running backs ran for a league-low 994 yards, averaging a league-low 3.3 yards per carry (and with a league-low 1 rushing touchdowns).
I was playing around with some numbers the other day and noticed that the Seahawks were unusually bad around the goal line. Inside the 10, they ran the ball 21 times, and those plays generated a grand total of 0 yards. That’s the worst by any team in the last 10 years. Only 14 other teams in those seasons, in fact, averaged under 1 yard per attempt in that part of the field.
Only two of those teams, at least, came back the next year and again averaged under 1 yard per carry.
(Note: the Rams have been the futility leaders in this category, averaging under 1 yard per carry in five of the last 10 years, but they finally got things fixed in a big way last year, with Todd Gurley punching in a bunch of touchdowns.)
| AVERAGING UNDER 1 YARD PER CARRY INSIDE 10 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Team | Att | Yds | Avg | TD | Next |
| 2017 | Seattle | 21 | 0 | .00 | 2 | ?-?-? |
| 2007 | St. Louis | 22 | 5 | .23 | 3 | 26-45-5 |
| 2015 | NY Giants | 25 | 12 | .48 | 3+1 | 20-34-6 |
| 2011 | St. Louis | 13 | 7 | .54 | 5 | 24-62-(5+1) |
| 2014 | Oakland | 20 | 12 | .60 | 2 | 27-31-5 |
| 2009 | • St. Louis | 19 | 14 | .74 | 3 | 29-27-5 |
| 2008 | Cleveland | 26 | 20 | .77 | 5 | 36-70-7 |
| 2016 | LA Rams | 27 | 22 | .81 | 7 | 42-103-14 |
| 2008 | Minnesota | 33 | 27 | .82 | 8 | 56-85-16 |
| 2015 | Denver | 28 | 24 | .86 | 5 | 33-50-9 |
| 2015 | Indianapolis | 22 | 19 | .86 | 4 | 37-90-11 |
| 2013 | Jacksonville | 23 | 21 | .91 | 7 | 17-30-7 |
| 2010 | Seattle | 40 | 37 | .93 | 10 | 33-43-8 |
| 2010 | • St. Louis | 29 | 27 | .93 | 5 | 13-7-5 |
| 2015 | Cleveland | 25 | 24 | .96 | 4 | 29-64-10 |
| 2014 | NY Jets | 34 | 34 | 1.00 | 7 | 30-55-8 |
| 2015 | San Diego | 16 | 16 | 1.00 | 4 | 36-40-10 |
(Additional note: figures include 2-point conversions. The 2015 Giants and the 2012 Rams scored on 2-point conversions, so you see the “+1” notation in their touchdown totals.)
The Seattle numbers are so wildly bizarre that I had to go back and check to make sure we didn’t make some kind of error. But there they are: 21 carries for 0 yards. Breaks down as follows:
• Chris Carson, 1 carry for 0 yard.
• Eddie Lacy, 4 carries for 0, 0, 3 and -3 yards.
• J.D. McKissic, 2 carries, and they both went for 0.
• Mike Davis (just re-signed), 2 carries for 0 and 1 yard.
• Russell Wilson ran twice, for 1 and 2 yards.
• Thomas Rawls was their busiest back in that part of the field, with 10 attempts. They went for -5, -5, -4, 1, 1, 0, 0, 1, 3 and 4 yards.
—Ian Allan