Seahawks preview: Washington, Seattle both dealing with long injury reports

The Seattle Seahawks will not be facing Washington’s best on Sunday when the two teams face off in CenturyLink. That includes the fact that they’ll both be playing against a significant number of backups with starters on the mend, and that Washington’s best player, tackle Trent Williams, is also likely to be out.

Here’s their injury report from Wednesday:

The IR list includes starters/potential starters like Su’a Cravens, Mason Foster, DeAngelo Hall, Dustin Hopkins, plus Trent Murphy, who had nine sacks last year, and Jonathan Allen, the 17th overall pick in the 2017 draft.

Matt Ioannidis, an up-and-coming player on Washington’s d-line with 3.5 sacks this year, has already been ruled out.

Those who did not practice on Wednesday also include: Zach Brown, their leading tackler, Jamison Crowder, second on the team in receptions and their punt returner, Williams, Brandon Scherff, who was the 5th overall pick in 2015, starting guard Shawn Lauvao, starting center Spencer Long (that’s 4/5ths of the starting offensive line, while right tackle Morgan Moses is battling a sore ankle), and tight end Jordan Reed, a Pro Bowler in 2016.

Those who were limited on Wednesday include starting corner Bashaud Breeland, linebacker Martrell Speight (two starts this season), safety Montae Nicholson (five starts), and running back Robert Kelley (five starts).

Truly, Washington could be without six starters on offense, three on defense, their main punt returner, and if you include injured reserve players, their starting kicker, and really another 3-5 guys who could be starting.

Seattle’s Wednesday injury report wasn’t a lot better, though I think they’ll probably wind up with less of a catastrophe on Sunday.

We know that Luke Joeckel is out and that Earl Thomas is probably out. There doesn’t seem to be panic surrounding the rest. Yet.

I previewed Washington on the podcast this week with Sam Gold: