Super Bowl Takeaways

Photo by Adam Hunger from The Associated Press

The football season has officially concluded now that the two most unlikely participants in Super Bowl odds have faced off, and while it wasn’t one that will be remembered forever, it was a defensive performance that will be.

Seahawks defeat Patriots 29-13

This game simply came down to the defense and the quarterbacks.

We know about Seattle’s defense (well, some of us do, but we’ll get to that), but New England’s defense was a big story as well, playing some of their best defense in the postseason leading up to the Super Bowl.

And we know about the quarterbacks, where Sam Darnold led the league in turnovers, and Drake Maye actually had more total turnovers than Darnold from week 11 onward.

Both defenses came out blitzing, scheming, and making it difficult for the quarterback, and it’s why it was such a low scoring game.

But the key difference was how the quarterbacks handled it.

Darnold was not great. In fact, he said so himself that it wasn’t his best game.

But he continuously avoided pressure, and made sure to never put the ball in danger.

Drake Maye panicked, rushed things, and turned the ball over three times.

Both teams knew their defense was good enough to win the Super Bowl, and all they needed to do was simply take care of the ball to come out victorious.

Darnold did.

Maye didn’t.

Seattle Seahawks

At one point during the post game coverage, someone on ESPN said during the highlights that “these are not household names on this defense.”

And that’s because people didn’t pay attention to the Seahawks all year.

This defense had three all pro players in Leonard Williams, Ernest Jones IV, and Devon Witherspoon.

Their DVOA was top of the league for most of the year.

But the talk of the town was Matt Stafford’s season in LA with the Rams, the Eagles turmoil, the Niners injuries, the Patriots turnaround, and the Ravens and Chiefs struggles.

Nobody noticed Seattle.

But you better start noticing, because they aren’t going anywhere.

The only notable pending free agents are Kenneth Walker III and Tariq Woolen, they have the 6th most cap space in the league and can find ways to open that up even more, and one of the best young coaches in football in Mike Macdonald.

Those teams in the Pacific Northwest have to earn the attention of the public.

The Seahawks demanded it.

New England Patriots

There is no offseason I am interested in more than the New England Patriots offseason.

After a very surprising Super Bowl appearance considering they only won 4 games a year ago, the Patriots have to be disappointed, but confident in their future going forward.

But they can not shortcut this rebuild, no matter how close they think they are.

Drake Maye had an amazing year, but the Patriots played no elite defense in the regular season.

In the playoffs they played the Chargers, and he struggled.

Then he played the Texans, and he struggled.

Then the Broncos, and more struggles.

And obviously, the Seahawks delivered the final blow last night.

No quarterback who lost the Super Bowl in their second season ever got back to the game.

Marino didn’t. Burrow still hasn’t. Kaepernick didn’t.

The Patriots aren’t a Super Bowl team yet.

They benefited from an easy schedule and a very weak AFC.

But they can get there. They just need to do it the right way.

Continue to draft and develop. Continue to grow.

They need to not be scared to take a step back next year to take two steps forward.

But if they try to push their chips in right now, it might backfire and push their timeline back even further.