Can last season’s best defense hold its own in NFL 2014?
The Seattle Seahawks are in unchartered waters and boy are they loving it or what? For the first time, the team from Seattle will start the NFL season as the defending Super Bowl champions and every Seahawks fan would want to win them the coveted trophy once again. If this were to happen this year in NFL 2014, it would be historic.
The Seahawks were the best defensive team in the NFL last season. It was their defense that got them the championship, so the big question now is will that defense hold in the 2014-15 season as well? It will not be easy; for starters their opponents will get an idea as to what to expect from the Seahawks this time around. They would have studied them in detail and make plans to hurt them.
The reigning Super Bowl champions have a lot going for them however. In Pete Carroll, they have a coach that has transformed the franchise from top to bottom since taking over in 2010. The third oldest coach in NFL history to win the Super Bowl, Carroll led the fourth youngest team of all time to the league title. Let that sink in for a moment.
The Seahawks have added to their ranks. The likes of Cassius Marsh and Brock Coyle have been added and the fans couldn’t be happier. Then there are players like Richard Sherman, Kam Chancellor, Earl Thomas and of course Byron Maxwell. The “Legion of Boom” will be a year older and a year wiser with the experience of winning the biggest title that the NFL has to offer. They will need to guide the rookies and make sure that the standards don’t drop.
A lot will depend on Russell Wilson this season too. The young QB was sensational last season. Yes, he isn’t exactly part of the defense but his passing and the timing of those throws will go a long way in helping Seahawks win yet another big one.
So this brings us back to the million dollar question: Is this defense good enough to repeat last year’s feat? History would tell us that it will be tough but we think they can. The Seahawks are a young team and they have made some shrewd moves in the offseason to bolster their ranks. They now have more options and that makes them a frightening prospect.
Another thing that tilts the balance in their favor as far as we are concerned is the average age of the squad on the whole. This is a young team with a lot of players close to the peak of their careers. Yes, they might not be able to put up the kind of numbers they did last time but this defense still has enough in it to be dominant. If they do that, then it will take a monster effort from anyone to stop the Seahawks lifting the Vince Lombardi Trophy at the University of Phoenix Stadium in February, 2015.
Image Courtesy: By Mike Morbeck (Flickr: Seattle Seahawks huddle) [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons