Cardinals @ Seahawks Week #11

“It’s What’s Known as a Mismatch”

Matt Hasselbeck has been cleared to play for the Seahawks this week. Whoopety-freakin’-do. He will still be throwing the ball to a below average receiving corps. They do get Deion Branch back who hopes to make it through an entire game this season after being out since the first. Their leading receiver as of late has been TE John Carlson, who’s been demonstrating as of late an equally good ability with both catching and dropping balls. Fullback Leonard Weaver will be out again, the one man wrecking crew who beat the 49ers by himself. This Seahawks’ offense is a few good hits away from being the same offense that couldn’t score in the final 3 and 3/4ths quarters of the game versus Philly a couple of weeks ago. The Cardinals are prone to late hits and may lay one on Hasselbeck or Branch just to put them out of the game. Not that I would condone such a thing.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote how teams were loading up to stop the Seattle run after Hasselbeck was injured. Coach Holmgren said as much last week. It will be interesting to see how much respect the Arizona defense will pay to Hasselbeck’s return. I think they’ll still focus on the run until Hasselbeck proves he’s rust-free in this game. Matt did only have a 57.7 passer rating before getting his disc bulged. He has to overcome an injury and his poor play to have a chance of winning this game, which is a pretty tall order. The Cardinals have a fairly solid defense front to back, and have been better at stopping the run than the pass this year (and their pass defense numbers really suffered in that one game versus the Jets when they were missing SS Adrian Wilson). Still, the 49ers were able to move the ball on them last week, so they won’t need Tom Cruise peeling a Mission Impossible mask from his face to have some offensive success.

Where the Seahawks will lose this game, however, is defensively. It’s no secret that the Cardinals’ high-flying passing game has been blessed by no less than the Man Upstairs himself, who surely takes exception to the lack of public nudity laws in Seattle and will continue to smite the Seahawks as a result. Nobody likes to see naked people riding bicycles. The Seahawks’ secondary is like a book of matches, slight of stature just waiting to get burned. Without a pass rush since Patrick Kerney was lost to injury, I’m not sure the Seahawks will have any defensive solutions other than flat out blitzes over and over hoping for the occasional sack, pick, or 3 and out. With time, Kurt Warner could complete passes with the opponent’s entire roster milling about in the secondary. 45% of his career starts have gone for 300+ passing yards? That’s insanely good. As are Fitzgerald, Boldin & Breaston. The Cardinals have the 3rd best yards per pass by my rescored rankings, while the Seahawks have the 8th worst pass defense. It’s what’s known as a mismatch. Hightower has given the Cardinals a spark in the running game this year as well. The forecast has cleared up so weather shouldn’t be an issue at all in Seattle on Sunday. Somebody upstairs is making sure of that.

Speaking of all out blitzes, it was fun to watch the Cardinals line up and shoot the A gap versus the 49ers last Monday. I hope they do some of the same to the Seahawks this week – but I also hope they keep from dangling their numerous appendages over the line of scrimmage this time, as I don’t think the old ticker can stand seeing multiple interceptions called back again.

Cardinals -2.5 was the opening line and 2 units on the Cards was the recommended play, which is now sitting pretty with the line at -3 with varying degrees of juice.

Final Score Prediction: Cardinals 28 – Seahawks 20