Seahawks Blog

Seneca Wallace wore a number of hats on Sunday in San Francisco.

He also had two helmets.

One is equipped with a radio transmitter given to NFL quarterbacks. That's the one Wallace would wear should he replace Matt Hasselbeck at quarterback.

Wallace's other helmet has no radio, just the run-of-the-mill model that every player other than the quarterbacks wear. That's the one Wallace wore onto the field for his four plays Sunday when he put on his run-catch-pass show in San Francisco.

The Seahawks even had a person on the sideline responsible for holding onto one of the helmets at all times and making sure Wallace had the right one.

"Now tell me we're not thorough," Holmgren joked.

Equipment manager Eric Kennedy found someone just for that task of holding one of Wallace's helmet. One problem. Holmgren didn't recognize him so when the coach saw an unfamiliar fellow holding a Seahawks helmet on the sidelines, he worried a heist was underway.

"I thought he was stealing one of our helmets," Holmgren said.

No, the coach was told. That's just Wallace's helmet.

A knight has a squire to bring him his weapons, Wallace had an assistant to hold onto one of his helmets.

NFL rules allow the quarterback to have a radio transmitter in his helmet that allows him to hear instructions from the coach until the final 15 seconds of the play clock. The rules also say the offense can only have one radio-equipped helmet on the field at a time. That's why all the radio-equipped helmets have a green sticker on the back. It allows referees to keep track. Holmgren said a team would receive a pretty substantial fine if it violated that rule.

Holmgren was on the competition committee when the one-helmet restriction was first implemented, and he said it was prompted by examples such as the Steelers' use of Kordell Stewart. Pittsburgh could move Stewart to wide receiver and bring another quarterback into the game, thereby giving the Steelers the possibility of having two players with radio-equipped helmets on the field. That led to the resolution that even if a team had multiple quarterbacks on the field at the same time, only one of them could have a helmet.

So that explains why Wallace had two helmets to account for all his jobs on Sunday.

Being of Mexican descent, I'm glad to see the league do something to acknowledge its growing Latino fan base and pay tribute to Latino players present and past.

How many of you knew that Tony Romo's real name is Antonio, and that he's a third-generation Mexican American?

It was nice to see the Seahawks bring back Efren Herrera in Week Three to honor the occassion and the salsa band was good. And in San Francisco Sunday, the 49ers put on a halftime show that featured low riders, mariachi and Mexican folkloric dancers.

Some of that could be called stereotypical, but I appreciated the effort.

A common misconception is that Latinos in the U.S. are into just soccer or boxing or baseball. But speaking as someone who knows, a lot of us sports fans are really into football, too.

On a side note -- and on the subject of Latinos in sports -- I saw a couple of Mariners rushing to catch planes at SeaTac Airport today after I arrived from San Francisco. I wished Horacio Ramirez the best, despite all the criticism he took this year, and said hello to Adrian Beltre. I guess those guys couldn't get out of town fast enough after the baseball season came to end.

Alvin Pearman suffered a torn knee ligament during Sunday's game that will cost him the rest of the season. Doctors will let the swelling subside before operating to repair the knee and then begin a lengthy rehabilitation.

The Seahawks acquired Pearman for a conditional draft pick eight days before the regular season began. He was a prominent player in the Seahawks' special teams and combined with Lance Laury on the hit that caused a fumble on Cincinnati's kickoff return in the final minute of Seattle's Week 3 victory over the Bengals.

The Seahawks don't currently have a running back on the practice squad. Holmgren said Seattle will be looking for someone to fill Pearman's role.

Tackle Ray Willis suffered a sprained knee during the game, and he will be out about six weeks, coach Mike Holmgren estimated. Cornerback Josh Wilson suffered an ankle injury and will be out a week or two, Holmgren said.

It's not so much hand wringing occurring in the Bay Area the morning after Seattle tromped through town so much as a collective dismissal. Take San Francisco columnist Ray Ratto's piece:

The news from Candlestick Sur-la-Mer seems bleak, even hopeless, but let's be fair here: That's way too optimistic. The 49ers very well might be what we in the philosophy department here at Eton like to call screwed.

Youch. The lead to the game description was just about as dour.

In the first month of the season, the 49ers have gone from lucky to plucky to just plain yucky.

There's little to indicate it will get any better.

That was from John Crumpacker, who wrote the game account.

Different paper, different targets, same overwhelming pessimism.

Mark Purdy of the San Jose Mercury News: "Sunday's glaring lesson: Alex Smith is not the problem with the 49ers' offense." The rest of his column is here.

Tim Kawakami said Alex Smith's separated shoulder will doom the 49ers because his backup isn't any good. Here's the set up: "Alex Smith is hurt, and the 49ers are doomed." The rest of his column is here.

Hmmmm. Wasn't this the hot-to-trot preseason pick? The one that went out and had one of the best draft days in the league, choosing linebacker Patrick Willis -- who appears to be a legit star. They went out and signed Nate Clements as part of a defensive restocking. They beat the Seahawks twice last season and sunny days were supposed to be here again in San Francisco.

But the 49ers lost offensive coordinator Norv Turner and that unit has progressed this season as if it were treading in molasses. Very. Very. Slowly. But here were the Seahawks, the team they ran over last season. Just bulldozed them.

And the explanation for why yesterday's game was so lopsided was found up front. The 49ers offensive line couldn't handle Seattle's front seven. They gave up six sacks in the first half. They were responsible for seven of San Francisco's nine penalties in the game between false starts, holding and even a tripping penalty. At one point, Craig Terrill was clean through for a sack and the Niners resorted to tackling him from behind.

We spelled out the size difference in the blog on Friday. The 49ers are the ninth-largest line in the league. Tackle Jonas Jennings is 335 pounds, guard Larry Allen is 325 and the Seahawks are the ninth-lightest based on Week 3 starting lineups. But what happened on Sunday showed not only that size isn't everything but that the layman's explanation that Seattle gets bowled over up front simply doesn't apply. Not in Cincinnati's Week 3 loss in Seattle when the Bengals brought in the heaviest line in the league and their starting tailback proceeded to carry 13 times in the first half for negative 3 yards. And it certainly didn't apply in Week 4 when the Seahawks went out and treated the 49ers offensive line like the Maginot Lines and stormed around them en route to the quarterback.

Analyzing run defense is tough. You ask the players and they start talking about things like gap discipline and tight fits and manning your responsibilities. Every player in that front seven is responsible for a certain alley or gap on the field. Get pushed out of that spot and you were blocked out of the play. But sometimes it's not the blocking that removes the player from that spot, but his own attempt to make a play elsewhere, anticipating where the ball is going and trying to get there. That can be especially true for a defense like Seattle's, which has more speed than some teams. That speed and reaction can be bent back against the Seahawks and is one of the reasons why they were so vulnerable to cutbacks and changes of direction last season.