November Recap

Well, its the beginning of a new month, and hopefully the month of December will be one of opportunity and progress for all of our Northwest teams! The month of November as we look back now was a .500 month for the Seahawks, a tough .250 month for the Huskies, and a tragic one for the Mariners.

SEATTLE SEAHAWKS
If you rewind back to the pre-season and tell me that in the month of November the Seahawks would lose to the Cowboys & Redskins and beat the Ravens & Rams, I would have laughed at you. I guess I'm the fool this month. I don't have a whole lot to say other than I'm excited in the improvement I see in Marshawn Lynch, he is running the ball well when we need him too, he's even contributing more through the air than some of our top WR's. If the seahawks can figure out how to get a lead and keep it going into the 4th quarter, all we have to do is keep our defense off the field by putting the ball into Lynch's hands and with any luck, he'll pick up first downs and before you know it, you've iced the other team's offense by keeping them sitting and drained precious time off the clock. He has definitely done the lion's share of the work on our offensive front last month. I really hope Marshawn takes what he's done in November and carries it with him into December!

I am glad that the Seahawks have the opportunity to bully at least 1 post season team this year. The Baltimore Ravens showed up in Seattle and our special teams pounded them almost the whole game! Our defense held up well against Joe Flacco and the dangerous Raven's offense. It was all around a great game for Seattle. We showed what we are really capable of doing defensively and Steve Hauschka was the man who really made the difference in that game. The Seahawks are capable of doing great because of the intesity we play on the defensive side of the ball, but we can also be really inconsistant as we showed with an upsetting defeat to the Washington Redskins last Sunday. I was at that game, Sidney Rice was injured so you can't do much about that, but Mike Williams NEEDS to step up big time with him gone. We have to get something going in the pass game. Jackson and Williams need to develop some kind of chemistry together because Marshawn can't do it all. If you put us up against a team with awesome rush defense then we won't be doing much of anything offensively. Another young man that seems to be settling in to the way the Seahawks do things is Doug Baldwin. I couldn't be more excited for his future, I really hope we get the chance to keep him around and watch him learn and grow as a WR. He looks to me like a good go to kind of guy on 3rd downs, I would like to see him pick up more yardage after the catch but at this point, I'm just happy to see one of our recievers catching the ball.
The Seahawks started the month of December off with a very dominating performance against the Philidelphia Eagles. With Vick and Maclin injured for Thursday nights game we had a huge chance to capitalize with a much needed win against the Eagles, and thats exactly what we did! Marshawn Lynch had another huge game this year, accounting for nearly 150 yards of our 174 yards rushing total and scored 2 TDs. His longest rush of the game was 40 yards and he averaged 6.7 per carry! And to top things off, he gained 75 of his yardage AFTER first contact from Eagles defenders! You gotta love Beast Mode!!! Golden Tate another young guy stepping up big to help cushion our already dominate offense. Brandon Browner, David Hawthorne, and Kam Chancellor coming up with big INTs on the defensive side of the ball. And you gotta love seeing KJ Wright, our rookie LB stepping up and making plays against a very talented Eagles tailback, LeSean McCoy. This is EXACTLY what Seattle fans needed out of them tonight! This is the way that we need to play and are capable of playing, we just need to get into a good groove and stay consistant! They now get a week and a half break and will be back on Monday night Dec. 12th to play the St. Louis Rams!

Brandon Browner celebrating his INT against Eagles QB Vince Young!

Golden Tate celebrating his awesome 3rd quarter TD reception!












WASHINGTON HUSKIES
For anyone who hasn't already heard, the Huskies brought home the 104th Apple Cup with a 38-21 victory over WSU. This is the 3rd year in a row that the Huskies have won the Apple Cup, and Steve Sarkisian has yet to lose an Apple Cup as head coach of UW. This game however was Paul Wulff's last game as head coach of WSU. Husky fans will sorely miss Coach Wulff's presence as he went 9-40 over the last 4 years. The Huskies hold a series advantage over WSU with an Apple Cup history of 67-31-6 in their favor. Another fun fact is that Huskies have won 8 consecutive Apple Cups on 2 separate occasions, and WSU has never won more than 2 in row. However, WSU has won 2 in a row on 8 separate occasions! What a wonderful classic UW and WSU fans alike have in this awesome rivalry! I can't wait until next year's Apple Cup! Lets get 4 in a row! WOOF!

Well theres a lot of talk about the Huskies being chosen for either the Alamo Bowl or the Holiday Bowl. Coach Sark says he will be honored and would love to play in either. He also said that newness of the Huskies even going to bowl lately should be something that we can all be excited about, regardless of what bowl it is. Personally, I'd like to see the Dawgs go to Alamo Bowl, because of its big name and tends to have better games and teams that participate. However something Coach Sark said is that he likes to history that the Holiday Bowl has but nonetheless, they are both great bowls and both nationally televised so either one is great!
Chris Polk seems to be holding out until after the bowl game to declare whether he will return to UW for his senior year or ship out to the NFL a year early. He has plenty of time as the dead line for the NFL is Jan. 18th. Also, TE Austin Seferian-Jenkins is considering playing a little bit of UW basketball I hear once the football season comes to an end. Sark is trying to keep him on track and ready for a bowl game and taking it one step at a time. Which I think is a very good idea, prepare for the bowl game, play in the bowl game, THEN make up your mind on the basketball idea.
I'm sure the Huskies will enjoy the extended rest before a bowl game, at least Keith Price will. I hope he can get close to 100% healthy so he can perform top notch and give us a shot to win this bowl game! Hats off to a productive and entertaining year for the Huskies! And congrats to Chris Polk on another 1,000+ rushing season and to Keith Price for a UW single season record of 29 TD passes! Good job guys!

SEATTLE MARINERS

Well as we all know the Mariners on their offseason. We have a hand full of players that are native to other countries such Felix Hernadez. It would seem normal that they would want to return home for the offseason. But a tragic event took place in November for the Mariners when Greg Halman, a rookie outfielder from the Netherlands, returned home and died from fatal knife wounds. Halman was an icon in the Dutch Major Leagues in the Netherlands. He signed with the Mariners at 16 years old and spent 7 years with our organization. He was called up this year in May and hit a home run in his first at bat, he did get optioned back to AAA and went back and forth. This young man had plenty of potential and was going to be somebody in the MLB if you ask me. It is truly sad that this happened, he will be missed by baseball fans in the US and in the Netherlands. His former coaches back home say that he was looked up to by coaches and players alike. I haven't researched this subject enough to know exactly why this happened or if there is anyone being charged with his murder. I do know that his brother Jason was arrested but I do not know the current status of that. I hope that all players around the world can stay safe and healthy for the remainder of the off season. Hopefully the M's can stay on track and work towards honoring Greg with a productive and inspired 2012 season. Rest In Peace Greg, you are missed.

Thats all for today folks! Thanks for reading! A lot of the information on this page is my own opinion but most of the facts or stats I got from various sources like ESPN, Wikipedia, Seattle Times and the official websites for the Seahawks, Huskies, and Mariners. I would appreciate any feedback. Thanks again!

Rebuilding teams in the Northwest

My wife hates hearing me talk about sports, so she suggested I start a sports blog. So, here goes nothing! I am going to keep my first post simple and not get into too many stats or rants. I will just explain a little bit about some of the common things I will be posting on. I was born and raised a very proud Seattle sports fan. I am an uber fan of the Seattle Seahawks, Washington Huskies, and the Seattle Mariners. However, I am not like your usual "uber" fans, I am very realistic when it comes to the teams I root for. Some fans have an unrealistic sense of who their team really is and that is not what this blog will be about.
The Seahawks and Mariners are both teams that are currently rebuilding so I do not find it shocking that the M's finished this last year at the bottom of the AL West and after 11 games into the NFL season I'm not at all surprised to see the Hawks at 4-7. They got a lucky break that the real Baltimore Ravens didn't show up to play in Seattle 2 weeks ago and a few more weeks back against the New York Giants. However they have had some disappointing defeats against teams like Cleveland and Washington. So I think it all balances out. It will be interesting to see how the next couple of years pan out in the NFC West for the Hawks and the AL West for the M's. I think the Huskies are going to be a fairly dominate force in the Pac-12 over the next couple years though! For people who are bad mouthing the Huskies... I think you need to clean off your glasses and see this thing for what it really is. This year, they lost against Nebraska, Oregon, Stanford, USC, and Oregon State. In my opinion, the only upset against the Huskies was Oregon State. They played great games otherwise. They won the games they needed to win and they lost the games that they were the underdogs in. Just think about it, Steve Sarkisian inherited a 0-12 Huskies team after the Ty Willingham era. Since then he has helped us produce a 5-7, 6-6, and now a 7-5 Huskies team. What more can you ask for than improvement and progess? Its unrealistic to think that we would be any farther than we are, it would have been nice to beat Oregon State and end at 8-4 but 1 bad game in a 12 game season is exceptable in my book. I'm very excited for the future with Keith Price, James Johnson, Kasen Williams, Bishop Sankey, and Kevin Smith. The only one I just listed that isn't a freshman or a sophomore is James Johnson. And to top it off, we are ONLY losing 3 seniors that have starting jobs on the defensive side of the ball. We are going to be a power house offense and honestly, our defense can't really get much worse, so they only have room for improvement. I just don't think the people trash talking the Huskies have any idea that they are right where they should be with even brighter days ahead of them! The Holiday Bowl is EXACTLY where the Huskies should be right now. Not fighting for the Pac-12 title, our defense can't hang with Andrew Luck and the Cardinal. Open your eyes people. 3 straight apple cups, going to a bowl game for the 2nd year in a row. C'mon. The Huskies are doing just fine and Sarkisian is doing his job. I do however question Paul Wulff's boss... How did he not get let go after last year? He inherited a 5-7 Cougar football team and since 2008 has lead them to an overall of 9-40. He took a 5-7 team and made them 2-11 the very next year. I will give him some wiggle room since he has been plagued with injuries almost every single year, but honestly, what team doesn't lose a key player for a good portion of the season? It will be interesting who WSU selects to try to clean up Wulff's mess. Well thats all I have for today. I appreciate you reading. And I would appreciate any comments or feedback as well. (It's my first time blogging so don't be too critical).