The Seahawks slumped to their first loss of the season, and Macdonald knows why.
The Seattle Seahawks fell 33-31 to the Washington Commanders at Northwest Stadium in a game that the Super Bowl champs simply struggled to get going.
Everything that was uncharacteristic of the Seahawks under Macdonald happened.
The defense gave up points and didn't create a turnover, while on offense, they were one-dimensional, with Sam Darnold having 45 pass attempts as he was picked off twice.
Jadarian Price had a fumble, and yes, they did rally late, but the normally reliable defense couldn't get that last stop it needed to give the ball back to the offense to then try and win the game.
And it all resulted in a loss, and some have tried to pick one play here or one play there that cost the Seahawks on the road in Washington, but for head coach Mike Macdonald, who was a guest on Seattle Sports, everything contributed to the loss.
“The whole myth of some games, these three plays matter more than other games, that's a dumb football legend,” Macdonald said. “Good football wins football games. So, what's good football? Being able to run it, being able to control a game, being able to affect the quarterback, taking care of the football, stacking plays, field position, great situational football, all those things.
“If you balance everything out, we didn't win those situations that you want to be able to win a game. and that ultimately is too much to overcome.”
Ultimately, Seattle didn't play good football.
The turnovers, which saw the Seahawks lose that battle 3-0, going 3/9 on third down, plus the defense not being able to get off the field at crucial times, doomed them.
Now, it's not the end of the world because, as good as Seattle is, we didn't expect the franchise to go 17-0, did we?
Still, there is a lesson that it doesn't matter who you play in the NFL, if you don't do enough things well on gameday, you will be beat.
And on Sunday, the Seahawks got a reminder of that.
