Will the Seahawks Challenge the Rams for the NFC West?

The Los Angeles Rams and Seattle Seahawks were the predominant powers in the NFC West last season. If not for Demarcus Robinson and Kamren Kinchens, Mike Macdonald might have won the division in his first year as head coach.

The Seahawks made a bunch of moves this offseason, with CBS Sports' Jared Dubin illustrating how Seattle can win the West in 2025. For each of Dubin's points, I'll make an argument to counter.

"The defensive improvement from the second half of last season holds, Klint Kubiak remakes the offense in his image and Sam Darnold plays like he did for the first 16 games of last season," wrote Dubin.

"Seattle checked in 18th in EPA per play defensively prior to its Week 10 bye, according to Tru Media, but came back and ranked fifth from Weeks 11 through 18. Adding Demarcus Lawrence up front and second-round pick Nick Emmanwori on the back end should help account for losses like those of Dre'Mont Jones and Rayshawn Jenkins, the latter of whom played a smaller role down the stretch anyway."

While Emmanwori is a phenomenal addition, that doesn't answer the question of how much of a liability Riq Woolen is in coverage. How Woolen regressed is unclear, but it's a massive point of concern. Also, Lawrence is older and coming off an injury, so schematically, there are ways to curb the pass rush.

"Kubiak's Saints offense lit the world on fire in the first two weeks of last season, racking up 91 points against the Panthers and Cowboys. Things fell apart from there as the team crumbled under the weight of injuries both up front and to the skill-position corps. But the Shanahan tree has been very successful at developing play-callers, and it's clear that Kubiak had some idea of how to structure the offense in a way that could make things easier."

Sam Darnold's monster season was a result of a McVay offense so there's no good indication on how he'll do in a Shanahan system. He does have experience, having played for San Francisco in 2023 but Darnold's not the achilles heel of the offense, the offensive line is.

While Seattle took massive strides to improve their unit up front, the Rams defensive line did the same thing so it will be up to the interior defensive line of the Rams to stop Seattle.

"The key will be getting the offensive line to hold up in front of Darnold, because he's very susceptible to pressure, as we saw in the Vikings' final two games of last season. If the Seahawks are able to give him time, he will be able to stand in the pocket and deliver the ball to the likes of Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Cooper Kupp (on whom the Seahawks are counting to stave off age-related decline), second-round pick Elijah Arroyo and more. Seattle also needs to get some kind of efficient run game going, because things were kind of a mess the last two years under Ryan Grubb."

To be frank, I have no idea if Cooper Kupp can still play at a high level. He couldn't with the Rams, and it was clear the problem was his lingering injury issues. Regardless, it's all about stopping Smith-Njigba.

Darnold always looks at the WR1 first on virtually every passing play. Last year, when teams simply blanketed Justin Jefferson with late pre-snap movement, Darnold couldn't adjust.

The key to beating Seattle is to win the battle for field position and to mess with Darnold's picture of what's happening late. That should keep Seattle at bay.

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