Both the Seattle Seahawks and St. Louis Rams are looking to start over in 2009. The teams combined to go 6-26 in 2008. With last year behind them both teams are looking to start over with new leadership. The Seahawks are now coached by Jim Mora Jr. and Steve Spagnuolo is the new coach of the St. Louis Rams. Both teams are looking to build their defenses around 2009 draft picks Aaron Curry and James Laurinaitis. Both players were outstanding in the preseason. Curry had 9 tackles and a sack, while Laurinaitis made 13 tackles and intercepted a pass.
Seattle will be glad to get Matt Hasselbeck back after only playing in 7 games last year. The Seahawks huge offseason pick up was T.J. Houshmandzadeh, and later they also added Edgerrin James to back up Julius Jones. In the 2009 NFL draft the Seahawks picked up Aaron Curry, Max Unger and Deon Butler all should step right in and have a huge impact this year.
The Rams are just looking to start over and move in the right direction. After removing the front office and almost all of the coaching staff it is now Steve Spagnolo's job to right the ship. The Rams picked up center Jason Brown, while adding Jason Smith and James Laurinaitis through the draft. The Rams are now very young and inexperienced since releasing a few veterans including Tye Hill their first round draft pick in 2006.The recent release of Chris draft 72 hours prior to the season starting also raises a possible team chemistry issue.
As for this weeks game, if it looks like, acts like, and quacks like a duck it is a duck. In this case that means clearly the Seattle Seahawks will win this week. The Rams have lost 8 straight games to Seattle, including a 37-13 pounding last year at Quest Field. For those that have forgotten the Rams have also lost 10 straight regular season games. Quest Field is a very hard place to play and the Rams will be heading there with an offensive line that has never played together. To make matters worse the offense was not able to get in any work in the preseason. Marc Bulger injured his pinkie and only threw 4 passes in the preseason. In addition an injury to Donnie Avery cost him the entire preseason, and Steven Jackson only saw enough action to get in 10 carries. After cutting Tye Hill the Rams will head into the game with Ron Bartell and Jonathan Wade as their starting corners and they will be forced to cover Houshmandzadeh, Burleson, Butler, and Branch who may not play. I love how the Rams defense forced turnovers and swarmed to the ball in the preseason but I just do not see the offense doing enough to win this one.
Prediction Seattle 23-10 over the Rams
Labels: Rams at Seattle, Rams predictions, Seahawks predictions, Seahawks vs Rams Matchup, Seattle vs Rams, Steven Jackson
The NFL has moved the St. Louis Rams @ Seattle Seahawks game to Sunday night at 7:20PM CST. In essence this is a playoff game with the winner claiming the NFC West crown.
