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Bruce Irvin Joins CBS Sports HQ
(4:00)
Russell Wilson has been in the NFL for eight seasons, and he’s accomplished a lot during his time in the league.
He’s made six Pro Bowls. He’s never finished a season worse than 9-7, and he’s reached double-digit wins in seven of eight campaigns. He’s won at least one playoff game in six of his seven trips to the postseason. He’s led the NFL in passer rating and in passing touchdowns and in fourth-quarter comebacks and in game-winning drives and he’s made an All-Pro team.
By any conceivable measure, he has been one of the small handful of most valuable players in the league since stepping on the field, and by one measure (Pro-Football-Reference’s Approximate Value), he has been the single most valuable player league-wide during that time. And yet, in eight seasons, Wilson has received exactly zero Most Valuable Player votes.
Despite that lack of recognition, Wilson is widely considered one of the favorites in the 2020 MVP race. William Hill Sports Book lists Wilson’s odds at 8-1, placing him behind only 2018 MVP Patrick Mahomes (3.5-1) and 2019 MVP Lamar Jackson (6-1). That trio is joined in the top five by Deshaun Watson (14-1) and Dak Prescott (15-1).
On Friday’s episode of the Pick Six Podcast (listen below and subscribe here for daily NFL goodness), Will Brinson is joined by Joe Fann of NBC Sports Northwest to discuss all things Seahawks, including Wilson’s MVP candidacy, whether or not Jadeveon Clowney will return to Seattle, and more.
“I think if I’m starting a franchise, I think Pat Mahomes goes one and I think Russell Wilson, even at age 31 now, goes two,” Fann said. “He’s certainly top five. You can’t honestly tell yourself that he’s a gimmicky quarterback at this point or that he’s just a scheme quarterback or whatever. We’re eight years in.”
Brinson and Fann also discuss Seahawks offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer’s run-heavy offense, the “Let Russ Cook” movement among Seahawks fandom and whether Wilson himself would prefer the offense become more open and pass-oriented, and what Wilson might look like in a scheme coached by Andy Reid, Kyle Shanahan, or some of the other most creative offensive minds in football.
“The Seahawks don’t have the luxury of being one of the most conservative teams in football,” Fann said. “Their defense didn’t earn it last year: 23rd in DVOA, towards the bottom in scoring, yards, all of it. Second worst in the NFL in sacks. And yet game in and game out you see Pete Carroll rely on his defense like they’ve earned that trust, and they just haven’t.
“And so when you punt on 50-yard line on 4th-and-inches, kick a field goal on fourth-and-1 on the 25 yard line … that’s what brings in the eye rolls and the groans, and deservedly so given who you have at quarterback, the limited prime that he has — who knows how long he’ll go, but it is finite.”
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