Another Seahawks home loss leaves coach more than mad. ‘Our fans deserve better’

Mike Macdonald is more than frustrated. His defense just got annihilated. His foundation — the reason the Seahawks replaced legendary Pete Carroll with him in the winter of 2024 — getting flattened has left the 37-year-old head coach...

“A little pissed, you know,” Macdonald said Monday on his 710-AM show. “Edgy.”

He said that the morning after quarterback Baker Mayfield shredded his defense with 379 yards passing and two second-half touchdowns. Mayfield’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers rolled up 426 yards and 38 points to beat Seattle on the final play at Lumen Field.

“We just didn’t play up to our standard,” outside linebacker Uchenna Nwosu said.

Macdonald’s defense battered by injuries to five starters has allowed 55 points in the last 66 minutes, dating to 6 minutes left in the game at Arizona Sept. 25. Before that, the Seahawks had held the Cardinals to six points in 3 1/2 quarters. They entered that Thursday game second in the NFL allowing just 15.7 points per game, and had not surrendered more than 17 points in a game.

That feels like eons, not 11 days, ago.

“Motivated, you know. Motivated to get it right. Motivated to move forward,” Macdonald said. “You kind of want to just play another game. You just want to go make it right immediately. But that’s not how it works. That’s where you’re at.”

The coach blamed himself for poor preparation and poor plays calls on defense Sunday against Tampa Bay (4-1). He blamed himself for not calling the right plays to get more pressure on Mayfield. The Seahawks didn’t touch the quarterback until 8 minutes remained in the game. That was on a safety blitz by D’Anthony Bell.

Macdonald blamed himself after the game Sunday, and again Monday morning.

“Yeah, there’s definitely plays that I want back,” the coach said Monday. “I’m probably more upset about what went into the week and how we got to the game, and how prepared we were, and that goes into how we play, you know, how we play defense, how like, our style of play, how well we execute our process. All those things wasn’t our standard.

“You know that’s my job. And when you when you fall short of what your responsibilities are you feel like you let your guys down.”

Coach: Injuries are no excuse

Bell was playing Sunday because rookie safety Nick Emmanwori briefly went out injured in the fourth quarter and returned to the game. Emmanwori was back from a high-ankle sprain playing for the first time since the first five plays of the opening game Sept. 7 against San Francisco.

When Macdonald did blitz the Bucs, it was often with former practice-squad safety Ty Okada. Okada ran directly into Tampa Bay’s offensive linemen most times.

He was playing because Pro Bowl safety Julian Love missed the game with a hamstring injury.

Pro Bowl cornerback Devon Witherspoon missed his third game in four weeks. He was getting his bruised knee ligament tested with imaging again Monday morning, to see if he can play Sunday when the Seahawks (3-2) visit Jacksonville (3-1).

Defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence missed the Tampa Bay game with a thigh injury. Cornerback Riq Woolen left in the second half with a concussion.

Woolen’s and Witherspoon’s injuries meant Nehemiah Pritchett played cornerback. Mayfield and receiver Emeka Egbuka targeted Pritchett on the second-year man’s second play, for a touchdown.

The Bucs did it again with 68 seconds left in the game, when Mayfield spun outside away from Seattle’s edge rusher Boye Mafe, who was getting double-team blocked as the only defender near the quarterback. Pritchett grabbed at the arm of Buccaneers receiver Sterling Shepard in the end zone but missed him. Shepard moved free toward the middle of the end zone to catch Mayfield touchdown pass. That tied the game at 35.

“We have to plaster better,” Pritchett said, using the defensive backs’ and coaches’ term for tighter coverage of receivers down the field.

After that tying score, Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold then got hit on by free-blitzing safety Antoine Winfield Jr. as he threw an interception to Lavante David at the Seattle 35 with 53 seconds to play. That gifted Tampa Bay its winning field goal on the final play.

Macdonald refused to use the injuries on his defense as a reason, or excuse, for his unit failing so thoroughly.

“The non-negotiable is how we execute, and the style of which we play. And that is what is disappointing, is that we fell short of that,” Macdonald said. “And that comes to what we’re asking the guys to do.’”

Fans ‘deserve better’

The mystique and advantage of Seattle playing on its home Lumen Field is gone.

Since Macdonald became their coach before the 2024 season, the Seahawks are just 4-8 playing in what used to be one of the most advantageous home fields in the NFL. They are 9-1 on the road under Macdonald.

This has been an issue for years in Seattle. Under Carroll, the Seahawks were 13-12 at home from 2021 through ‘23.

It’s something Macdonald has emphasized with his players and coaches all offseason into this season. Yet they are 1-2 at home this season, 2-0 on the road. The Seahawks’ only victory in Seattle came three games ago over then-winless New Orleans.

Sunday, there was a festive atmosphere inside Lumen Field. The Seahawks were celebrating their top 50 players of all time. Hall of Famer Steve Largent, former NFL MVP Shaun Alexander and former Super Bowl quarterback Matt Hasselbeck were among those honored on the field at halftime. Marshawn Lynch, Earl Thomas, Michael Bennett, Cliff Avril and many others from Seattle’s back-to-back Super Bowl teams were at an event Friday night at team heaquarters Macdonald attended.

Sunday, both teams were their popular, throwback uniforms from when they came into the league together as expansion teams in 1976.

The sun was out. It was another loud, packed house on what was a glorious, early-autumn day in Seattle.

Until the Seahawks defense played.

“It was an incredible atmosphere...electric,” Macdonald said. “It’s great having all of our people there. The 12s are awesome.

“That’s probably why you’re frustrated, is the amount of the investment we have and not getting the return.”

That’s why Macdonald and his coaches are spending the next couple days evaluating how they are teaching and drilling. They are assessing how they are tackling, to combat the poor tackling that continues to be a problem particularly after opponents catch passes. “Our tackling right now is not our standard,” the head coach said. “And we work it every day.

“For the amount of time, for the amount of things that we invest into this, we’re not getting the returns. And so...something needs to change, whether it’s a personnel decision or whether it’s on the front end of how we change it.

“You’re looking at the process, all the things that go into everything. That’s what we’re evaluating right now,” Macdonald said.

“That’s why we feel the way we do (Monday) morning, because our fans deserve better when we were playing at home.”

Sam Darnold’s final play

Darnold had his best game so far as Seattle’s quarterback. He completed 28 of 34 passes for 341 yards and four touchdowns.

Yet Sunday, he took the blame for the interception in the final minute. He said he should have changed the protection at the line of scrimmage before the snap to deal with Winfield’s safety blitz to the QB’s left.

Macdonald said Monday what Darnold also said Sunday evening: He should have thrown quickly to his “hot” receiver on the backside. Rookie Tory Horton was open running an out route to the right sideline against soft coverage over there.

If Darnold did that, who’s to say the Seahawks don’t go down and kick the winning field goal in the final 53 seconds and are a 4-1 team right now? They had already rolled to 476 yards on the Buccaneers defense Sunday.

“We could have flipped the protection there. But our offense is also based off of we don’t have to be right every time with the protections,” Macdonald said. “And if you’re hot, we get rid of the ball and we move forward.

“We’ve got to be decisive in those moments. You know, you got to make a decision, and you got to rock with it.”