At the beginning of the 2011 season this might have been a decider for the NFC West. The defending champion Seattle Seahawks building in their second season under Pete Carroll and the San Francisco 49ers finally making best use of the talent on their roster under the direction of their new head coach. Only one of those pre-season prophecies has been realized but with a late season surge of form the Seahawks are still not out of playoff contention and this matchup is still one of the most intriguing on the Week 16 slate. After a crucial Monday night win over the Steelers the 49ers, coming off a short rest, have two divisional games left to clinch a first round bye whilst the Seahawks require two wins to have any hope of a playoff game. Something has got to give in this game.
The first encounter between these two squads all the way back in September in Week 1 gave some early signs to how far out in front the 49ers would be in this division with a 16pt victory, but few thought they would be in the running for a first round bye. The Seahawks have made strides since then and with their home field crowd behind them on Christmas Eve the atmosphere is sure to be electric as Seattle seeks to stay alive in the playoff hunt. Here are three matchups to keep an eye on as this game unfolds.
Keeping up with the… Smiths
It seems only fair after he exploded on Monday night against the Pittsburgh Steelers that we first turn our attention to Aldon Smith as the Seahawks will surely have been spending much of this week formulating a plan to limit his impact this Saturday. Keeping Smith out of base packages has ensured that rather than hitting the rookie wall the seventh overall pick from April’s draft has only got stronger as the season has gone on. Smith has graded above +1.5 for his pass rushing in each of the 49ers last three games, with two of those being above +6.0. With the Seahawks being without Russell Okung the pressure falls on the shoulders of Paul McQuistan to keep Smith quiet. The issue for the Seahawks in this game is that if they divert too much attention to preventing Aldon Smith repeating his great Monday night performance, they open the door to favorable matchups for the 49ers defensive player of the year candidate Justin Smith. The 49ers played these two off of each other sublimely on Monday night and in combination the Seahawks will be hard pressed to negate their impact this Saturday. The solace for the Seahawks and something they will need to use is the mobility of Tarvaris Jackson. Ben Roethlisberger was a statue in the pocket on Monday night, if the 49ers repeat their tactic of aggressively stunting the Smith’s off each other to the inside expect to the Seahawks get Jackson to the perimeter of the defense to punish the 49ers aggression.
Making it “Rainbow”?
For the Seahawks to get this all important home win it seems likely that they will need Marshawn Lynch to get at least one dose of Skittles and break the 49ers streak of 15 games without conceding a rushing touchdown. If anyone is going to break this record breaking run by the 49ers it is Lynch who has registered five touchdowns in his last three games. Ever since Lynch started his current seven games with 20+ carries streak, he has only failed to cross the goal-line in one of those games, at home to the Washington Redskins. This matchup is the epitome of the unstoppable force coming up against the immovable object, which will give? Lynch is not a one man band, though he is capable of individual runs that might convince you otherwise, and he will need far better play in the run game from in particular Robert Gallery. The Seahawks left guard comes up against Justin Smith this week who is capable of enough disruption against Gallery to allow the rest of the 49ers' defense to flow to the ball and contain Lynch, so Gallery will need to be at his best in this game.
Force the game onto Alex Smith’s shoulders
Both teams in this game are going to look to play the run first and force the opposing quarterback to beat them through the air, but the Seahawks in particular will be eager to force Alex Smith to beat them and not let Frank Gore take the game away from them. The Seahawks have the quality and depth in their front seven to take away the 49ers running game even if they persist with it in a close game and at some point Smith will need to make plays through the air. In recent weeks the 9ers signal caller has returned to his inconsistent former self, still making plays but particularly on Monday night against Pittsburgh missing a series of throws that allowed a bad Pittsburgh team (on the night) to hang around longer than they should have done. San Francisco need to Smith to be clinical in this game and take the chances he is given, otherwise this Seattle defense has the ability to blank the 49ers and deal a devastating blow to their hopes of a bye week.
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