Chris Carson looks great. Rashaad Penny has a broken finger.

Why did they spend a first round pick on him again?

It’s important to remember where the Seahawks were a few months ago.

Pete Carroll wants to run the ball. You might disagree. You might wish for a different approach, a more pass-centric offense. Yet Carroll decided who he is as a coach a long time ago and it involves running the ball as a feature.

Seattle’s running game wasn’t even hopeless last year. It was worse than anyone could ever imagine. It was probably embarrassing for Carroll.

To have the quarterback be your leading rusher, to have only one touchdown by a running back, to be so utterly useless in the red zone. Heck, to be so utterly useless in any situation.

And yet the win against the Eagles showed how good the Seahawks could be with a balanced attack.

Part of the issue was a bad O-line. Part of the issue was injuries to the running backs. Part of the issue was a lack of talent at running back.

So the clear focus this off-season was to fix this problem.

Not so fast though! The Seahawks had a bad cap situation and needed to move out several players to work their way out of a hole. On top of this, they’d spent their second and third round picks on Sheldon Richardson and Duane Brown in an attempt to make one final bold push for a Championship with the old guard.

Now they had hardly any cap space, weak draft stock and a growing list of needs.

They simply didn’t have the cap flexibility or draft picks to address all the problems in one off-season. So they prioritised. They needed to boost the running game. They needed a pass rusher.

They had pick #18 and turned it into Rashaad Penny and Rasheem Green.

For what it’s worth, I’d mocked Green in round one many times. Lance Zierlein in his NFL.com blurb described Green as a potential top-10 pick in 2019 had he returned to USC. He lasted into round three and Seattle took a punt on him. They also landed the running back they wanted, not the one who happened to be left on the board.

Two holes filled.

The hand-wringing over the Penny pick now seems to be over whether he was even needed with Carson on the roster. Yet people forget how unreliable Carson has been in his career so far. As talented as he is, he hasn’t been able to stay healthy. He played four games for Seattle in 2017. He only had 82 carriers for Oklahoma State in 2016 and 131 carries in 2015 — missing several games.

Who else was on the roster? The perennially injured C.J. Prosise and Mike Davis. Could you really go into the 2018 season hoping for a change in fortune for Carson and Prosise? Would it be acceptable for a team so determined to dominate with the running game to carry only one semi-reliable runner in Davis?

They could’ve added a free agent but that backfired emphatically with Eddie Lacy.

They took their guy. They looked at a really good class for running backs and chose who they wanted. Rashaad Penny. Only Saquon Barkley was off the board at #27. They had their pick of a really good crop.

Had they not taken Penny at #27 the alternatives could’ve been Austin Corbett or Will Hernandez. Both players are really good and we spoke about them a lot pre-draft. Yet the Seahawks had only just traded for Duane Brown and spent a second round pick on Ethan Pocic. They’d signed D.J. Fluker, who they appear enamoured with, and neither Corbett or Hernandez was an ideal fit at right tackle.

Perhaps they could’ve taken a pass rusher at #27? Maybe. Yet there were plenty of concerns about the somewhat overrated Harold Landry. Certainly enough for him to drop to #41 when many expected a home in the first round.

For the purpose of the argument though, let’s give the Seahawks Landry at #27. So now they’ve addressed the D-line. Their next pick is at #79.

By that point virtually all of the top running backs are gone. Remember, Carroll wants to run the ball. That’s the identity of his team.

By #79 the following were off the board:

Saquon Barkley

Rashaad Penny

Sony Michel

Nick Chubb

Ronald Jones II

Kerryon Johnson

Derrius Guice

Royce Freeman

The next running back to leave the board was Nyheim Hines in the fourth round (#104 overall).

By not taking your pick of the running backs at #27 you miss out on the good ones. So you probably double-dip on defensive linemen right? Take Rasheem Green to pair with Harold Landry. Not a terrible plan by any stretch.

Yet you’ve still not addressed the running game. The key priority.

Your next pick is #120. A couple more runners leave the board. Do you take one here? Only if you want to miss out on Will Dissly — a player who appeared to be specifically targeted to also help Seattle’s running game.

How much longer are you going to await to address this need?

And again, let’s say you just roll with Chris Carson and hope for the best. Hope he stays healthy. What if, like the previous three seasons of his career, he isn’t available to take on a full work load? What if he misses numerous games again? What if the running game, for the second year in a row, is horrendous?

Carroll again doesn’t have his preferred identity. He’s not accomplishing his vision.

They’re not playing his ball.

You can’t win that way. We saw what a team minus any kind of direction or identity looked like. It’s called the 2009 Seahawks under Jim Mora.

We live in a time where the value of the running game is being strangely questioned and overanalysed. Despite two of Seattle’s most recent historically great runners both being former first round picks (Shaun Alexander, Marshawn Lynch) there’s almost a disdain for drafting the position early. It’s easily forgotten that the first team all-pro list for 2017 was littered with players not drafted early (the running backs were both first and second round picks):

Tom Brady (R6)

TE Travis Kelce (R3)

TE Rob Gronkowski (R2)

WR Antonio Brown (R6)

T Andrew Whitworth (R2)

G Andrew Norwell (UDFA)

C Jason Kelce (R6)

DE Everson Griffen (R4)

S Kevin Byard (R3)

DB Darius Slay (R2)

RB Todd Gurley (R1)

RB Le’Veon Bell (R2)

Can you find running backs later in the draft? Absolutely. Let’s not pretend it isn’t possible for every other position though — or fail to recognise many of the top backs are drafted early.

Ultimately I think this best sums it up. Seattle took the second best running back in a draft billed as the ‘year of the runner’. They also manipulated the board to get a very intriguing pass rusher in round three. They still have a big need on the defensive line but guess what? The 2019 draft will be billed as the ‘year of the pass rusher’. Guaranteed. Next years draft will be loaded with defensive linemen.

Considering this isn’t a one-year reset, they probably played the draft the right way in 2018 while setting themselves up for next year when there’ll be a lot more cap space and a D-line friendly draft class.

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