Happy Blue Friday, 12s! Yes, I will continue to call us “The 12s” even though “Primetime” doesn’t think it matters a whole lot. Well, Centurylink averages nearly three false starts per game and crowd noise is a key factor.

Anyhow, the Seahawks are set to play in front of their home crowd against the Arizona Cardinals this weekend. Arizona has always been a thorn in Seattle’s side, historically, but I believe the Seahawks have the edge in this game. As always, I dig into the basic statistics for both sides and attempt to analyze and predict what could happen.

In my preview from last week, I was dialed in with my projections if you want to take a look by clicking here. If you’re like me and just want the bottom line up front, here it is: I predicted that Chris Carson would have a massive game rushing, that Tyler Lockett would find his groove once again, Seattle defense would pick the ball off, and that Christian McCaffrey would be limited to less than 100 yards on the ground, but thrive as a receiver. All came to fruition. I also predicted the Seattle defense would score six points, and that happened. However, it was reviewed and reversed to negate the play.

This week, the Seahawks are taking on a reeling Arizona team who is trying to find their identity. The Cardinals are among the worst defensive teams in the league and the Kyler Murray led offense is not all that stellar either. I’m terrible at fantasy football and projections, but if you’re in your finals, I would recommend starting Russell Wilson, Tyler Lockett, and Chris Carson—all three are statistically likely to have a massive game.

Let’s dig in and take a look at the chart below, noting the previous week differences:

Total Offense and Defense

The Cardinals are good at one thing: holding on to the football. They lead the NFL by only coughing up the ball 6 times. I talk more on this down below under the passing category. The Cardinals rank in the bottom 10 in terms of total yards, first downs, and third-down conversions. The Seahawks, however, are extremely generous to opposing teams with total yards per game (YPG)—but not as generous as the Cardinals who rank dead last giving up 413.1 YPG. The Cardinals also give opposing offenses the most first downs per game and the second-highest third-down conversion rate where the Seahawks rank pretty high offensively in those categories. As always, the Seahawks have had issues fumbling the football, which needs to continue to tighten up as they work their way into the postseason.

I have discovered some interesting numbers regarding points per quarter. Here is a little spreadsheet detailing how both teams defenses fare. Included are the home statistics for the Seahawks and away statistics for the Cardinals since the game is in Seattle:

Seahawks and Cardinals Offensive and Defensive Statistics Per Quarter

This is a concerning graphic if you are going to solely focus on the numbers. Cardinals are averaging 24 points on the road this season. The Seahawks have allowed an average of 29.4 points to visitors. Conversely, the Seahawks average 27.5 points per home game this season whereas the Cardinals give up 27.3 points per game while visiting. At home, the Seahawks tend to come alive in the fourth quarter, thanks to Russell Wilson and his determination to come from behind and secure a victory. This comes as good news since the Cardinals defense gives up an average of 11.7 points in the fourth quarter while on the road. The Seahawks tend to be giving in the second quarter at home relinquishing 10.2 points on average. The Cardinals, on the other hand, tend to struggle in the second quarter so that average might go down after this weekend.

Digging Deeper

Seahawks Scoring Trends by Quarter

As you can see, the Seahawks score more in the second and fourth quarters. In fact, they have always scored in the fourth quarter of every game this season. The reason the trend line goes down is because of how often they have scored in those quarters. Look at the third quarter. The trend is moving upwards because they have been blanked six times in the third quarter this season. Naturally, the trend will rise since anything is higher than zero. In Week 4, against the Cardinals, the Seahawks’ scoring by quarter went 10, 10, 0, and 7.

One thing the defensive plot graph pointed out was that the Seahawks have yet to surrender more than 14 points in any quarter this season. For a defense that is banged up and statistically ranked low, that seems impressive. Scoring in every quarter is decreasing since the beginning of the season up to last week. Quarters two and four seem to be the thorn in the defense’s side. Fatigue could likely be a factor since these are the later minutes of each half.

Additionally, in nine games this season, the Seahawks have not allowed opposing teams into the end zone in the third quarter, and seven of those nine games did not allow a single score.

As for this match-up, both teams defensively have a better third quarter than the rest of the game. This is likely due to coin toss deferments where the offense is on the field.

Rushing: Offense andDefense

Offense: The Seahawks, to no surprise, run the ball more often than not. I don’t expect this to change. Chris Carson averages nearly 20 touches and 4.4 yards per game. He’s tallied 1,190 yards and averages 85 YPG. He has 7 rushing touchdowns to his name. He has six games over the century mark and has at least 50 YPG 12 times this season. He’s fumbled seven times, losing four—which is likely why he did not get the Pro Bowl nod. This season, Seattle has rushed the ball on 47% of their plays while rushing 53% of the time last week. At home, the Seahawks rush the ball 45.8% of the time. Therefore, I expect another heavy workload for Carson against a Cardinals defense who gives up 122.7 YPG to opposing teams on the ground.

The Seahawks average one rushing touchdown per game and tendto find the end zone less at home averaging 0.8 touchdowns per game at homethis season. However, in their last three games, they have found the end zoneat least once and twice last week against a porous Carolina defense.

Here are the rushing trends for the Seahawks:

Seahawks Rushing YPG

The graphic above shows that the Seahawks are gaining more and more rushing yards per game. Per the trend line, the Seahawks are expected to get around 125 yards on the ground, barring any outliers. The Seahawks have also rushed for 100+ yards in every game this season except Week 1.

For the Cardinals, newcomer Kenyan Drake is coming off a 137 campaign against the Browns where he scored four touchdowns. On the season, he has rushed for 591 yards and has tallied five touchdowns. Obviously, most of his numbers come from just a week ago. Whether at home or on the road, the Cardinals rush the ball roughly 39% of the time. However, they found success in the running game against Cleveland a week ago, rushing nearly 60% of the time. I do want to note that Cleveland is the sixth-worst rushing defense in the league. I don’t expect the Cardinals to put up the same number against the Seahawks.

Lastly, the Cardinals average 1.1 rushing touchdowns per game this season, while finding the end zone slightly more on the road at 1.2 per game.

Defense: Opponents’ rushing trends against the Seahawks are moving upwards. With the nagging injuries to Jadeveon Clowney, Ziggy Ansah, and Al Woods, this trend is going to likely continue going up until all three are healthy and on the field at the same time. Additionally, Bobby Wagner, the leading tackler for the Seahawks, tweaked his ankle against the Panthers. The Seahawks did sign veteran linebacker Dekoda Watson due to these injuries.

https://twitter.com/seahawksPR/status/1207388976975237120?s=20

I’m willing to bet the Cardinals are going to do a whole lot of running. In Week 4, the Seahawks allowed the Cardinals to rush for 115 yards. I imagine the Cardinals will be on target to do the same this weekend, considering the injuries sustained on the Seahawks defense.

Seahawks’ Defense Rushing YPG Allowance

For the Cardinals, I don’t expect them to hold the Seahawksto under the century mark. They are allowing an average of 122.7 rushing yardsand 27.6 attempts per game. As I mentioned, the Seahawks rushed for 115 in Week4 so they, too, should be on target to meet or exceed that previous mark.

Passing: Offense and Defense

Offense: Despite rushing the ball as much as they do,the Seahawks rank tenth overall in the NFL in the passing category. However, RussellWilson is one of the most sacked quarterbacks in the NFL. Infact, he is one sack shy of being the most sacked QB in franchise history.He is currently tied with David Krieg with 341 sacks. Krieg played 12 seasonsin Seattle to amass the sacks where Russell is in his eighth. Russell has onlyfour games this season under the 200 yards benchmark. Additionally, theCardinals rank dead last in the NFL in passing YPG allowance at 290.4 yards pergame. Quarterbacks facing the Cardinals also tend to have the highestcompletion percentage of 71.6%, also ranking the Cardinals’ defense dead lastin the league.

Seahawks Passing Trends

As you can see, Russ threw for over 200 yards in Week 4 and will likely do the same this week against an atrocious Cardinals secondary. The passing YPG is on the downslope but that is likely due to the two anomalies where Wilson threw for 400+ yards in Week 3 and nearly 350 yards in Week 9.

Unfortunately, Russell Wilson will be without Josh Gordon, who was suspended indefinitely for illegal substance violations. I truly enjoyed watching him play, as limited as it was. Let's relive that catch from last week:

https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1206284982513061888?s=20

For the Cardinals, they are averaging 214 YPG which is amongthe worst in the league. Believe it or not, Murray has been sacked five morethan Wilson this year. The Cardinals are a heavy throwing offense averaging38.2 pass attempts per game but that comes at a cost of interceptions (13 forthe Cardinals) where the Seahawks’ defense is third in the league with 16picks.

Defense: Quarterbacks usually lead the way on every team in terms of fumbling the football. Kyler Murray has been sacked a massive 46 for a loss of 305 yards times this season but has only fumbled the football four times. While the defensive front is banged up for Seattle, even if they get to Murray, I don’t expect a whole lot of turnovers.

Seahawks Passing YPG Allowance

For the Seahawks’ defense, they have had issues. However,those numbers went down after Week 9 where opposing quarterbacks have beenlimited to under 300 passing YPG. In Week 4, Murray threw for a shade over 200yards, is considered stellar for the Seahawks’ secondary. As I mentioned, theSeahawks statistically have a mediocre defense, but they have never allowed anopponent to score more than two touchdowns in any quarter this season. Therefore,I consider that to be successful.

Injury Report

As of Thursday, non-participants include S Quandre Diggs, T Duane Brown, LB Bobby Wagner, DE Jadeveon Clowney, CB Shaquill Griffin, DT Al Woods, and LB Mychal Kendricks.

Limited participants include C Joey Hunt, G Mike Iupati, TE Luke Willson, WR Tyler Lockett.

Full participants include DE Ziggy Ansah, T George Fant, LB Cody Barton.

https://twitter.com/bcondotta/status/1207820540662038528?s=20

Kendricks, Griffin, and Clowney are game-time decisions, where Ansah and Willson are expected to play.

Up-to-date injury coverage will be provided when it becomesavailable. Make sure you follow us on Twitter @CascadiaSN to see those updates.

Bottom Line

I’m expecting a high scoring shootout type of a game. Depending on which defensive players are available for the Seahawks, there could be some disruption upfront and Kyler Murray will end up making mistakes. The Seahawks have been picking the ball off lately so I expect that trend to continue. I am expecting a run-heavy game for both teams. If Seattle’s middle defensive starters are out, Arizona will have a lot of success on the ground. However, I think Russell Wilson will decide to air out the football a little more than usual considering the poor pass coverage of Arizona.

Based on my numbers above, I’m expecting a 28-24 score favoring the Seahawks. Carson will get at least 100 yards on the ground and Russell should surpass 250 yards in the air. I think the secondary, even without Diggs, will come away with at least one interception, but I would guess two. The Cardinals don’t fumble often so I figure INTs is the only way Seattle will force turnovers.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. It took a while to put it all together to get a better understanding of what to expect. Your feedback is always appreciated and I look forward to putting up the final piece of the regular season next week.

Give me a follow on Twitter @BaseballDudeMan! Go Hawks!