With Jamal Adams Sidelined, Seahawks Hold Utmost Confidence in Ryan Neal

RENTON, WA - Ryan Neal isn't Jamal Adams. The Seahawks fourth-year safety knows it, coach Pete Carroll knows it, and teammates such as star linebacker Bobby Wagner know it.

Stating the obvious, Adams and Neal took drastically different paths to the league. One is a household name, while the other one certainly isn't. Drafted sixth overall by the New York Jets in 2017, Adams entered the NFL with much fanfare and became an immediate superstar. Neal, on the other hand, went undrafted out of Southern Illinois and briefly contemplated retirement after being cut by three different teams, including Seattle prior to the 2020 season.

With Adams set to undergo shoulder surgery on Thursday and miss the final five games of the regular season, Neal isn't putting pressure on himself to try and replace one of the NFL's true defensive unicorns. He understands who he is and what he isn't.

"The one thing is this, I’m not Jamal," Neal bluntly told reporters on Wednesday. "That’s a special kid with special talent. I’m Ryan Neal, so Ryan Neal’s going to do what Ryan Neal’s going to do."

But while he would be the first to admit he isn't on the same spectrum from an overall talent standpoint compared to Adams and won't be able to replicate everything the three-time All-Pro does to impact games, the Seahawks have full confidence in Neal filling the void in his absence. And why wouldn't they?

After beginning last season on Seattle's practice squad, with safeties Marquise Blair and Lano Hill going down with injuries the week prior, Neal earned a game day elevation in Week 3 with Dallas coming to town. Up until that point, though he appeared in four games in 2018 and 2019, he had never played a defensive snap in the regular season.

But when Adams came up lame in the third quarter with a groin strain, Neal's chance to impress finally arrived and he capitalized on the opportunity. Thrust into action in the heat of a high-scoring shootout, he played the remainder of the game at strong safety, registering four tackles on 29 defensive snaps. Most notably, he emerged as an unexpected hero in a 38-31 victory by intercepting Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott in the end zone with 16 seconds left to play.

Starting in Adams' absence each of the next four games, Neal exceeded all expectations, including his own. Taking advantage of his first extended run as a starter, he recorded 29 tackles, an interception, and three tackles for loss, proving himself more than capable of playing at a high level when called upon and earning the respect of his teammates and the coaching staff in the process.

"It gave me experience. Before that, I had never played in an NFL game before as a starter, full time," Neal reflected. "It taught me a lot of things. I learned a lot from the game then. Things happen fast, you’ve got to be ready to rock and roll. In those four games, I had to just figure it out real quick. I had to rely on the guys around me."

More than a year later, the Seahawks once again need Neal to step into Adams' role for an extended period of time. But on a personal level, he feels far better prepared and more confident in his own abilities thanks to the experience he gained last season along with playing quite a few snaps in dime packages this season.

Both on and off the field, Neal has also worked diligently absorbing everything he can watching and learning from Adams, aiming to model aspects of his own game after the star safety. The goal? Even if he isn't a clone of his predecessor, he doesn't want his presence in the lineup to limit what Seattle can do schematically on defense.

"I really hope that me shadowing him and learning from behind him can help us remain having that flexibility in our defense and stuff like that and not have to shy away from anything that we’ve been doing," Neal explained. "That’s the hope that I can give the coaches and hopefully they can trust me to do the job.”

When Neal started last season, the Seahawks did operate a bit differently from a scheme perspective. According to TruMedia, they ran Cover 3 on 55 percent of their defensive snaps with him in the lineup, second behind only the Chargers during that span. With Adams back in the lineup from Week 9 through Week 17, that percentage dropped to 48 percent with the team using more "middle of field open" coverages such as Cover 2, Cover 4, and Cover 6.

Seattle also wasn't near as aggressive blitzing without Adams in the lineup. Per Sports Info Solutions, the team's blitz rate plunged from 36 percent to 18 percent when Neal replaced him, causing their pressure rate to drop from seven percent to three percent as a result. Neal only rushed the passer 19 times, or less than five percent of his snaps, generating three pressures and a respectable 15 percent pressure rate.

Having watched Neal develop from a fringe practice squad player into a capable spot starter and reliable reserve in sub packages over the past two-plus seasons, however, Carroll doesn't foresee swapping him for Adams altering what the Seahawks can do defensively at all this time around.

“They are a little bit different of a style, athletically," Carroll remarked. "But all throughout the time that they’ve been together, Ryan has been patterning himself to play the position in the same fashion, whether it’s been in pressuring, covering, over whatever. It won’t change us at all in what we are trying to do."

Looking at Seattle's defensive trends for this season, Neal may indeed be better equipped to play the role of super sub and minimize the overall impact of Adams' injury and it's not just because he has more experience in the system.

First, Seattle hasn't blitzed Adams near as much this season, as Pro Football Focus charted him with 51 pass rushes on 872 defensive snaps, which equates to a 5.8 percent blitz rate. Last year, Norton sent him 12.3 percent of the time, or more than twice as often. This helps explain why he didn't have a single sack in 12 games with the team dropping him back in coverage more frequently.

When Neal has been on the field in dime packages, he's rarely been blitzed, but like last year, he has been efficient with limited opportunities. On 10 rush attempts, he's produced a pair of pressures and sacked Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence in a Week 8 win, suggesting he could still be effective with an occasional blitz even if he's not the pass rushing maestro Adams is.

As for coverage scheme concerns, the Seahawks have still been deploying Cover 3 on 44 percent of their snaps, which ranks fourth in the NFL this year and isn't a big difference from how they have played throughout the Carroll era. Though there has been an uptick in Cover 6 usage up to 11.5 percent and they have used more two-deep safety looks in general to play to Adams' strengths, they won't have to reinvent the wheel with Neal checking in.

Inevitably, there will be a drop off replacing a perennial All-Pro with a backup and as Wagner noted, the team will miss his energy and unique skill set. But while losing a player of Adams caliber would be catastrophic for most teams, the Seahawks can take solace in the fact they have a starter-caliber player in Neal waiting in the wings who has already proven himself in multiple roles.

While his heart aches for Adams, Neal understands his team needs him more than ever to offset the loss of his friend and teammate. After receiving invaluable on-the-job training last year as well as this year in a situational role, he's entering this latest opportunity with the same mindset ready to do whatever it takes to help Seattle win games down the stretch.

"For me, it’s just the same thing. Step in, be accountable, be there for the people around me, be there for my team, the defense, the coaches. Everything. Of course, it’s an opportunity for me, but it isn’t about me. It’s about everybody else and how can we keep things rolling in the direction we’ve got it. My whole mindset is step in, do my job, do it to the best of my ability to help us win games. That’s just how I’m looking at it.”

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