The Seattle Seahawks have shocked a lot of the NFL by starting the season 2-0. Yet, there are some power rankings that still have them in the 20s, they believe that beating the Denver Broncos and New England Patriots wasn't enough.
The Patriots beat a really good Cincinnati Bengals team in Week 1, which tells me that the Seahawks actually are better than many people think. Well, some people agree and some don't.
Seahawks are ranked all over the place in various NFL power rankings. The highest being 7th by CBS Sports, but they've also hit as low as 21st in the Pro Football Talk rankings.
Power rankings in general are based on people's opinions, so we prefer to look at something like Pro Football Focus (PFF) grades. This is exactly what PFF grading does:
"The PFF grading system evaluates every player on every play during a football game. We believe that #EveryPlayCounts and that attention to detail provides insights and data that cannot be found anywhere else. The grading system was founded on the principle of grading “production” rather than traits or measurables, but perhaps a better way to describe it is a player’s “contribution to production” on a given play."
"Each player is given a grade of -2 to +2 in 0.5 increments on a given play with 0 generally being the average or “expected” grade. There are a few exceptions as each position group has different rules, but those are the basics. The zero grade is important as most plays feature many players doing their job at a reasonable, or expected, level, so not every player on every play needs to earn a positive or a negative."
Well, the way PFF looks at it, the Seattle Seahawks are one of the best teams in the entire NFL, grading in at the 2nd best team in football only behind the New Orleans Saints. @SamiONTap on YouTube breaks down every single category in full:
Here is how some of their rankings came in:
- 1st overall coverage grade: 90.6
- 1st overall special teams grade: 90.3
- 2nd overall grade in the NFL: 88.1
- 2nd overall defense grade: 86.5
- 5th overall passing grade: 78.3
- 6th overall offense grade: 73.5
- 6th overall run blocking grade: 74.4