September 4, 2014
As the regular season begins, the Seattle Seahawks have made multiple improvements to the roster, including the addition of stud wide river, Eric Decker. Decker, 27, was a former player of the Denver Broncos and New York Jets. The Seahawks acquired him in a trade with the Jets that sent young cornerback Jeremy Lane to New York along with Seattle's 3rd and 5th round picks in the upcoming draft. Decker has impressive numbers and was one of Peyton Manning's favourite passing targets in Denver.
The Seahawks also picked up Free Agents WR Jerome Simpson, WR Austin Pettis and young quarterback Sam Bradford. Bradford was the most surprising pickup as the Seahawks already have their quarterback set with Russell Wilson. Here's what rookie coach Matt Green had to say about the pickup of Bradford.
"When free agency opened up, there were a few players we had our eyes on, some of them we got but others went to different teams. After a while we noticed Sam still in the Free Agent list and couldn't resist the pickup. He's 26 and was a previous first round pick and obviously has a ton of potential. I don't see us using him a lot in games but you never know when your starting quarterback will get injured so at least now we are prepared. Also I see him as a trade asset that we can use in a trade somewhere down the line"
The Seahawks also started off on the right foot with their first game of the season, defeating the Green Bay Packers 17-14. It was a tight game all the way through, but with less than two minutes left, Bruce Irvin laid a massive hit on Green Bay's Eddie Lacy in the Packers zone on first down, causing the ball to fumble out and get recovered by Irving. This lead to a 24 yard field goal by Steven Hauschka with one minute left in the game. It looked as if the game was over, but with less than 15 seconds left the Packers managed to get the ball back into the Seahawks 25 yard mark with some exigent passes by Aaron Rodgers and some poor penalties by the Seattle defence. Fortunately the Packers were out of time outs so the clock went to 0 before the Green Bay could kick the ball for a field goal.
More to come from the Seahawks next week when they take on the San Diego Chargers.