Darryl Tapp, Final

Coming into this offseason there was all of probably 4 or 5 players on this defense I did not want to see leave this team. Darryl Tapp was probably 1a behind Mebane in the category. I was very upset when we traded him for all the reasons you stated, he was cheap, healthy, and on his way to being better. How much better we’ll never know.

When I would get upset about it I was told I was falling into Seahawks.net levels of overreaction by my friends. I’d complain about letting our best pass rusher go and I’d get snarky remarks about him only having two sacks last year. I’d point out his hurries and they’d say that was just a way of saying “almost” and that “almost” didn’t count. They’d say that he couln’t have been that good because look how bad our defense was and they were fine with blowing our defense up. Being unable to hold a rational argument about the trade made rather frustrated.

I still don’t understand this move. It feel like we opened a hole we have yet to fill. And when I point this out I’m told “Quit whining and give Pete time.” Like I have no reason to be slightly distrustful. Now I can’t mention anything about the Seahawks without having eyes rolled at me. Thanks a ton, Pete.

Coming into this offseason there was all of probably 4 or 5 players on this defense I did not want to see leave this team. Darryl Tapp was probably 1a behind Mebane in the category.

He won the Lunch Pail like 3 years in a row.

who is the starting end in our base formation?

in the sense that both stats are team-driven to a certain extent, and far too much credit is given to the single player who earned it. Generally speaking, a 20-win pitcher is better than a 10-win one, and a DE with 16 sacks is better than one with 8, but it’s not like the former is twice as good as the latter. If you look at 2009 Darryl Tapp and only see 2 1/2 sacks, then you aren’t seeing the whole game….and if you compare him to the 2007 version of Chris Clemons and conclude Clemons was nearly 4 times better, then that is unequivocally incorrect.

The Tapp trade was akin to giving up a dollar for two quarters; hopefully Carroll can make up the difference by the time the season starts.

but when I think of good DE, Tapp doesn’t even really register. He’s no Jacob Green. He’s no Michael Sinclair. He’s no Phillip Daniels. He’s no Chike Okeafor. He’s no Michael McCrary. He’s no Patrick Kerney (before the demise). Tapp isn’t in that class. He’s a borderline starter at the DE position. He’s far from Lamar King or Anton Palepoi inept but I’m not sure if he is even better than the guy he replaced, Bryce Fisher. He’s the undersized try-hard guy that brings it every down but isn’t really fast or strong enough to intimidate any opposing tackle. We have seen Tapp’s ceiling. He is who we thought he was.

I admit that I really liked Tapp. But in the way that I really liked the hobbit kid in the movie Rudy.

Progress is often grown wholly from a challenging of the norm and beating into us the idea that the FO is neither perfect nor more knowledgeable helps us become better critical and independent thinkers. Unless a system or group has proven themselves to be perfect, I will always be an advocate of challenging it and reevaluating it. I’m a sports fan; faith is in no way required.

Regarding your personal struggles, I’m glad you acknowledge that you have limitations and are human. If you said otherwise I’d no longer be reading this blog. We are all biased and have an unhealthy love (and hate) of some players and moves, which can often cloud our judgement. We get upset, we overreact, we have opinions. I believe that’s what this blog is for, to discuss and debate on our favorite football team. Quite frankly, you had an opinion and you gave it. People don’t like it they can discuss it with a cool head or leave. But don’t feel bad for what you love and where your loyalties are.

And to those that turned on Tapp: fuck you all.

Honestly, I don’t think you have to apologize. It’s actually very understandable.

(almost embarrassingly personal but well written on a topic of great expertise)

Anyway: Tapp. Consider me on the fence. He was an exciting player. And getting better. In 2007 he was a liability against the run. By 09 he was stout. He had some very nice pass-rush moves. But he also got stood up regularly by opposing tackles. He was another Seahawks defender that looked like a probowler against the NFC West teams but would get swallowed up by the big boys.

I liked Tapp. I seriously questioned the trade, partially because I think he was worth more than a 4th. Also because we don’t really have anyone better at DE. But, ultimately, I do think we need a better defensive line. And only Mebane is ‘untouchable’ (everyone, of course, has a price)

Then the Tapp and Sims trades. But that’s another story and I’m done talking about it. Go Whitehurst?

Is it a place to get good insight and information about the Seahawks or is it like talk radio where the host constantly expresses a personal and emotional opinion contrary to the audience to get a rise out of people. The Tapp thing felt like the later, becuase it was all emotion based. It certainly wasn’t intentional like obnoxious talk radio, but it absolutely had to be emotion based because there is no evidence whatesover that Tapp is anything but an average player. I can even remember when you compared him to other average defensive ends who later went on to have break out years, and offered that as proof that Tapp will dominate. Out of that small sample, you could have used thousands of others who had the same numbers but didn’t break out. The trick of football scouting is to look outside those numbers and see if someone will bloom. You were defiinitely doing that, it’s just that so was the team. The Seahawks decided when you weren’t looking.

It seems that your judgement was very separate than what the team was thinking. I would love to see more analysis from the team – in other words access to the thinking of the players and coaches. We pretty only get what John Morgan thinks.

I love this site! I guess I just want more.

football is a business, and what they sell is emotion. it happens

I think the hardest thing about blogging is people commenting and emailing that can tear you apart. It has caused many a writer to stop. The FG community seems pretty level headed for the most part, so I hope we don’t drive you away. Your site provides something unlike I’ve ever seen in sports blogs. Keep it up.

We’re fans, we discussing football at a time when nothing is going on. As fans we get emotional.

nobody will care that Tapp is gone.

Since we’re all holding hands now I will take the time to weigh in, then avoid these topics going forward if at all possible. After all, this is John’s place in which we are visitors. I don’t count myself among the ranks of “a certain segment of the fan base buying into every decision”, as I’ve been critical of a number of the team’s moves in the past. But I realize the difficult position writing for a site like this puts someone in. You have to form an opinion, explain it, and then defend it from all angles in an instant-response forum. Nobody has all the right answers and even the most experienced and astute football minds make mistakes and errors in judgement. It’s a tough, complicated sport with big rosters and a myriad of variables.

What did bother me, though, was the consistent drumbeat of extremely negative statements that were so pervasive around the time the Tapp and Whitehurst trades went down. No need to rehash it all now; we’re all weary and sick to death of both subjects. This is a fan site, and fan sites are by nature reactionary and hyperbolic. That’s fine. Part of why we enjoy SBN blogs is the level of humor and sarcasm. But some of us have grown accustomed to the academic base of a few other sports blogs and it was kind of a shock, to me at least, to see such knee-jerk absolutism. The Tapp and Whitehurst trades are certain mistakes, therefore Carroll/Schneider are irreparably incompetent was the all-encompassing wisdom, and differing viewpoints were pretty forcefully shouted down. And that led into the drama of the Jimmy Clausen debate with yet more shit-flinging between people with differing opinions. Morgan felt that Clausen was the best prospect in the draft, then 47 players were picked before him. So clearly there are a lot of different ways to look at this sport. But the level of vitriol spewed at Carroll/Schneider over their early moves was overboard, and for awhile, anyone who took a different position was quickly bludgeoned over the head with the apparently irrefutable fact that the moves were blindingly stupid and the new regime was incompetent.

Obviously it was way too early in the process for a judgement like that, as it still is in the other direction, but it was hard not to take that personally at some point when mods and others would state these things as fact, over and over. Many of us bring knowledge and experience to our positions as well. I’ve met Pete Carroll (shook his hand and said hello, more or less) and saw him work up close when I was working for ABC Sports. I was on the sidelines for a number of USC games including the 2004 Rose Bowl. Nowadays I’m at Qualcomm Stadium working with a network broadcast crew for at least half of NFL Sundays. And I’ve been a diehard Seahawks fan since the team’s inception and continue to closely follow the Hawks and the NFL. But I don’t even aspire or come close to what Morgan does. He breaks an ungodly amount of tape. He dissects college football and throughly ingests every play of the Seahawks season. I don’t, especially the last two seasons. That does not make me unqualified to have an educated opinion on Seahawks players and management, because I do consume volumes of information during (and before/after) the season.

With that experience comes some admitted biases. For good or ill, I liked Whitehurst before his name ever came up for consideration, because I had seen him play here in San Diego. Maybe I fell in love with the hair and the beard too, I don’t know, but I thought I saw something in the guy as an NFL quarterback. And I saw Carroll’s USC teams and how he ran them like a pro organization. It was obvious that he was not just a college coach. He was an energetic, feel-good players coach, yes. But more than that his entire program was run like a pro organization. Literally, if felt like an NFL team (quite literally, some would argue). There was accountability from top to bottom, from Carroll, Nick Holt, Steve Sarkisian, down through Leinart, Bush and Tatupu, all the way to the equipment managers. His staff and players were intensely prepared and confident but not arrogant. Growing up I hated USC but was extremely impressed with how Carroll did things. So having seen that up close, I probably took the negative reaction around here too personally. I had to disengage for awhile.

Not sure I’ve reached a cogent point here. I did want to mention that during the dark days after those moves, Morgan went out of his way to send me a personal apology when one of our disagreements went too far. I appreciated that and thought it showed a lot of personal integrity. It takes a lot of hard work and huge balls to put yourself on the line day in and day out on a blog where a bunch of rabid football fans are waiting to scream about their own feelings and tear apart others. I appreciate that nerve and all the effort. I don’t always agree, but it is always worth reading, and I’m thankful for that.

We got Weaver from you guys too. Yaaaay!

Haha, just kidding. Great writeup – And I’d be interested to see the 1,800 word piece you’re talking about. Got a link?

Nice draft by the way, fellas. The real steal of the draft was a vet, Leon Washington.

Field Gulls went nuclear when Tapp was traded. You weren’t around for the first few hours. That’s not to say some of us didn’t draw from your articles on Tapp to form an opinion prior to the trade, but you weren’t alone in the overreaction.

Insult to injury is the trading up to draft Brandon Graham. I mean, I love Andy Reid, always liked McNabb, really really liked Dawkins, but I’ve almost always rooted against the Eagles, probably because of how much respect and attention they always got, but anyway, I don’t hate them, just have always rooted against them. But I want Tapp to compete for DPOY.

Just like I want Bruce Campbell to show everyone he should have been a 1st round pick. And Clausen. Crabtree, even within the division. It’s natural to want your opinion to be corroborated. I root for the Hawks, I root for good football, but I also find myself rooting to be right about the players I think will be good, or against the ones I don’t. I hated the trade so much. I strongly want to see how Tapp’s career turns out, to gauge my own views on him. So the Brandon Graham pick was kind of frustrating.