The thought of Jared Allen on the Super Bowl-champion Seattle Seahawks is about as scary as NFL nightmares get for opposing quarterbacks. After all, Allen might no longer be the player he used to be, but he’s still only 31 and is coming off a bad year in which he still recorded 11.5 sacks and
But what makes this truly scary is that playing in Seattle could give Allen a special opportunity to pin his ears back as somewhat of a situational pass rusher. We’ve all seen what that type of role has done for John Abraham well into his 30s, and Allen would have enough support from Michael Bennett, Cliff Avril and Brandon Mebane that he could have a chance to excel in a big way and in sustainable fashion.
He never misses games due to injury — hasn’t since 2007 — and he hasn’t had fewer than 11 sacks since 2006. Nobody on Seattle’s defense had more than 8.5 sacks last season. So even at face value Allen would make this defense significantly better.
But what if a change of scenery was in fact all he needed to rediscover what made him the NFL’s most lethal sack artist only two years ago?
I don’t expect Allen to pick up 22 sacks again, as he did in 2011, but if at the age of 32 he can find even a happy medium between what he did in 2013 and what he did in 2011, the Seahawks will come away from this major winners.
Earlier this week, we talked about how the Denver Broncos and New England Patriots had somehow managed to use free agency to pull further away from their AFC counterparts. Well, with moves like this, the young Seahawks would only be widening the gap between themselves and everyone else in the NFC.
So much for parity?
