Dave Boling: Special plays outweighed special teams gaffes in Seahawks win over Jets

In the National Football League, so many games swing on a single key mistake. One or two often make the difference.

But not this cavalcade of blunders by both teams, the highlights of which not deserving of the kind of stentorian narration offered by the late John Facenda, but rather a PeeWee Herman-type, with calliope accompaniment.

It is a vastly overlooked strength in the NFL to win a game when doing everything it takes to lose it, as the Seahawks did Sunday, taking down the 3-8 New York Jets, 26-21, to retain their NFC West Division lead.

MetLife Stadium was the site of their greatest win, over Denver in Super Bowl XLVIII. This game was far less exhilarating than that, but much more satisfying than one of their greatest injustices (see: Vinny Testaverde helmet TD, at the old Meadowlands in the same area). Sensational plays by Leonard Williams, Devin Witherspoon, DK Metcalf, Jaxon-Smith Njigba, Julian Love and, sure, placekicker Jason Myers, helped the Seahawks overcome the rampant flaws on special teams, and a memorably ineffective offensive series in which the Hawks had eight plays in goal-to-go situations, and not only failed to score, but moved themselves backward from the 1 to the 16.

But a win is a win, even if it’s more of an escape, and this was the Hawks’ third straight. Unconventional, horrifically homely at times, it counts as a “W” in the standings.

Since I can’t find a specific statistical analytic metric for this kind of dubious victory, some need to be devised to suit the trend of quantifying athletic performances.

To escape a game this calamitous deserves a designation such as: Win Above Deserved Defeat (WADD). The Jets, meanwhile, would be tagged with a Defeat Earned By Blunders (DEBB).

So many plays earned high WADD points, and they all were needed to move the Hawks to 7-5.

The special teams, alone, should have doomed the Seahawks. Dee Williams and Laviska Shenault each lost fumbles on kickoffs. High DEBB points on those. These two have been shaky at times earlier, hinting of a vulnerability to costing the team eventually.

But after the first fumble, Geno Smith pulled the Seahawks back into the game, leading an 88-yard drive, keyed by two big completions from Smith to Smith-Njigba (no relation, except in their capacity to come up with timely connections).

The Hawks gave up a touchdown return on a kickoff, as well.

But Leonard “Big Cat” Williams saved the day several times, blocking a PAT and then intercepting New York’s Aaron Rodgers and returning it 92 yards for a score. Big WADDs earned.

Williams may be the Hawks’ team leader in WADDs, as he also sacked Rodgers on the late drive that could have reversed the outcome.

The timeliness of the Williams pick-six was truly an early game-saver, as it appeared Rodgers was about to take the Jets in for a score to go up by a likely insurmountable 28-7 margin. Instead, the Hawks were back in it at 21-13.

After the embarrassing stall at the Jets goal line in the third period, when the offense wasn’t able to punch in from less than a yard, the Seahawk defense continued to be stout, or, at times, lucky the Jets weren’t able to come up with enough WADD plays themselves.

So, the defense gets the win on this day. After the New York kickoff return for the touchdown early in the second period, the Hawks held them without a point for the remaining 41 minutes of play.

Seven of the 21 points surrendered came against the special teams, and one of the touchdowns came on a short field after a turnover. That’s the kind of stinginess that is sometimes required to win.

It was Williams, and an aggressive secondary, and recently acquired linebacker Ernest Jones IV, who have turned around this Seattle defense, and caused the team to go, in less than a month, from the bottom of the NFC West to the top.

And learning how to win, in spite of a wad of sloppy play, is a talent that could help them stay there.