Seattle Seahawks: 5 offseason needs

3. Stop the running back carousel

Pete Carroll likes to say he wants teams to know they played the Seahawks. That means hard hitting on defense and offense with a punishing running game. When Marshawn Lynch was running over dudes in Seattle, we got it. When Thomas Rawls was healthy, he was a bowling ball of butcher knives.

That was the thought with Eddie Lacy and Chris Carson. Lacy looks washed and Carson got hurt, but the reality should be clear: none of the guys in the Seahawks backfield are capable of carrying the proverbial load. They’re the right type of back—big, physical, punishing—but the unique trait Lynch possessed was not just his ability to run over you, but away from you.

Having power backs works great, but if a team can’t rip off chunk plays with the running back, either in the run game or passing game, that limits the offense. Seattle could look to the draft to address this issue, or get creative and sign someone like Dion Lewis to handle the third-down and split out role, with Carson coming off injury and Mike Davis showing some juice.

Either way, they need to get a steady hand in the backfield to get this run game back on track.