The Seahawks’ Super Bowl win over the Patriots didn’t go the way a lot of people pictured it. What had “shootout” written all over it turned into a slower, defense-driven grind, pressure, field goals, and not many clean possessions to work with.
Former Patriots tight end and Super Bowl champion Benjamin Watson joined Action Network to explain how the game swung so hard toward Seattle, why the Patriots’ offensive issues got exposed on the biggest stage, and why rookie quarterback Drake Maye’s first Super Bowl, painful as it was, could end up being a turning point instead of a setback. Watson also pulls from his time in New England, Baltimore, and Cleveland to lay out why Seattle’s defensive identity carried the night, why a Super Bowl loss sits with you in a way other losses don’t, and what it means for both teams heading into next season.
This interview transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
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Key Takeaways from Watson’s Super Bowl Analysis
- On the game’s tone: “It turned into kind of a defensive slugfest.”
- On Seattle’s defensive edge: “They’re able to get pressure with four, and drop eight into coverage.”
- On the decisive stat: “Six sacks, and to me, that was the difference.”
- On how the Patriots were beaten: “All of their supposed weaknesses were exploited.”
- On the emotional weight of losing: “Losing the Super Bowl is a nightmare. Even if you play well.”
- On Drake Maye and shared responsibility: “You can’t put all the blame on one person. Football is the ultimate team sport.”
- On what comes next for Seattle: “The hardest thing is sustaining success."
Super Bowl First Impressions: Pace, Feel, and Why Seattle Won
Q: Benjamin, good to talk with you after that Super Bowl. What stood out right away, and how did the game feel from the opening kick?
Benjamin Watson: Well, first off, there was a lot of anticipation for the game. I had the opportunity to go to San Francisco last week, do a lot of interviews on Radio Row, and engage with a lot of former teammates and friends, those sorts of things. So it was fun being in the Super Bowl city. There was definitely a buzz around it, primarily because of the history with the Patriots and the Seahawks as well.
On the unexpected defensive tone:
I didn’t know what to expect, but I was expecting more points, especially in the first half, than what we saw. It turned into kind of a defensive slugfest, which, if you’re a defensive guy, which I am not, you were really happy about what you saw. Lots of field goals. I think the field goal kicker set a record with five field goals in the game.On limited possessions and early adjustments:
And so that’s how the game was being played. It was interesting to see, especially in the first half, how each team started to acclimate their gameplay to how the game was being played, limited possessions.On Seattle establishing the run:
The run game was really important for the Seahawks. The very first play of the game, Kenneth Walker rattled off a 10-yard run. And so that was kind of the way the Seahawks were going to play.On the defensive difference:
Defensively, I thought the Seahawks played extremely well, especially up front. They got a lot of pressure on Drake Maye (six sacks) and that was, to me, the difference. If you can run the football, and if your defense can create havoc in the opponent’s backfield, they really prevented the Patriots from doing anything offensively for most of the game.
Was It Elite Defense, or Offensive Underperformance?
Q: When a game turns into a defensive slugfest like that, is it more about the defenses playing well, or the offenses not executing?
Benjamin Watson: I’m glad you brought that up. It was a little bit of both.
On the Patriots’ offensive line struggles:
The offensive line for the Patriots, you’ve got a rookie over there at left tackle in Will Campbell, you’ve got two young players over there, especially on the left side. There were multiple times where Seattle’s defensive line was able to displace the offensive line off the line of scrimmage, putting the offensive tackle right in the quarterback’s lap.So sometimes they were getting beat up front, but sometimes they were literally being moved into Drake Maye’s lap. And it’s difficult for a quarterback to operate when he’s got, you know, 600 pounds of person in his face.
On Seattle generating pressure with four:
But that’s what Seattle has done all year. They’re able to do it with four rushers. And what that simply means is: they obviously have blitz packages where they’re bringing extra rushers from the slot, adding guys into pressure packages, but when you’re able to get pressure with four defensive linemen up front, it allows you to drop eight into coverage. And that’s advantageous against the passing game.On Mike Macdonald’s defensive identity:
And so Mike Macdonald, the head coach, he’s a defensive guy. I actually met him. I went to the University of Georgia; he went to Georgia too. I was in Terry College of Business, a finance major, so was he. He’s just a couple years younger than me.We didn’t really know each other until Baltimore. I was playing for the Ravens and he was a defensive assistant there in 2016, that’s when we connected, made the Georgia connection. Georgia Bulldogs, go Dawgs.
I was pulling for the Patriots, clearly that’s my team, but I’m happy to see him have that type of success.
Drake Maye’s First Super Bowl: “Nightmare,” or Unfair Criticism?
Q: Some headlines called Drake Maye’s first Super Bowl a “nightmare.” Is that fair, or are people being too hard on a rookie on this stage?
Benjamin Watson: Losing the Super Bowl is a nightmare. Even if you play well, it is a nightmare. It’s the pinnacle: the zenith of the sport, the zenith of so many people’s careers. It’s what you plan for, prepare for, perform for, for a lifetime. Many people never even make it to that point.
On the uncertainty of getting back:
The difficult thing is that you don’t know when you’ll be back. You always feel like, “Oh, we’ll be back next year.” But the statistics show that most teams that make it to the Super Bowl don’t return, even to the playoffs, the very next year. And so you just don’t know.On turnover and regression risk:
With all the turnover in the NFL, and the Patriots are a perfect example of a team that had a lot of turnover, they came in with 30-something new players, the most of any team in the NFL. You see them go from 4–13 to 14–3 because of turnover. But likewise, turnover can also inhibit your ability to come back to the playoffs and the Super Bowl the next year.On how the Patriots lost:
So anytime a player loses, it’s a nightmare. But specifically for the Patriots, the way they lost the game is difficult to digest because all of their supposed weaknesses were exploited. It was protecting the quarterback. It was giving up pressure. It was the lack of explosive plays in the passing game. They really couldn’t get anything done in the run game. They ran up against a juggernaut of a team, but that’s what the Super Bowl is about.On Drake Maye’s long-term outlook:
Nightmare? I don’t know. I think Drake Maye’s going to learn a lot from this. This is a young team, a young quarterback. Coach Vrabel has done a great job. He was a teammate of mine when I played in New England! He’s the perfect fit for the culture. The players gravitate toward him.They’re going to learn from this, all of them, including Drake Maye. And I think the “nightmare” piece of it is that even if it was a nightmare, you look across the field at Sam Darnold and the nightmarish career he had up to that point. If anything, Drake can say, “Man, the story’s not over.”
And for all the guys on the Patriots team, the story’s not over. Just look across the field at Sam Darnold and the path he had to take to get to where he was. That same thing can happen for you as well.
Will the Super Bowl Loss Hurt Drake Maye Long-Term, or Become Fuel?
Q: Long-term, do you worry a loss like this could stick with Drake Maye, or is this the kind of thing that becomes fuel?
Benjamin Watson: It’s more about hitting the positive side of it. As an athlete, it’s always important to have a true evaluation of what happened.
On shared responsibility and context:
I was watching Coach Vrabel talk about the game, and a reporter asked him that exact question about Drake Maye, about the turnovers. He threw two interceptions, a couple of bad interceptions that were just errors, unnecessary throws. And there were times when he didn’t escape the pocket or use his legs the way we saw him do throughout the season.And Mike said very plainly, which is what you’d expect, you can’t put all the blame on one person. He’s the quarterback, so obviously the blame and the praise go to him. But if he’s getting pressure, if his receivers aren’t getting separation, if they’re dropping eight because they’re getting pressure with four, there are a host of different things. If you can’t get the run game going, you can’t get your play action going. A lot of things impact quarterback play, and really everybody’s play.
On maturity and resilience:
Football is the ultimate team sport. So yes, it can negatively affect him, but I don’t think it will, primarily because of the maturity he’s already demonstrated, even as a young player.He’s got enough people around him to say, “It’s the Super Bowl, man. This is the toughest it’s going to get. You lost in the last game against the very best team in the league.” The key is to glean specific improvement points, whatever those may be. You have to digest the tape, lean into it, be upset about it, feel the pain of it, feel the anxiety of it.
On embracing the pain to improve:
Tom Brady, a teammate of mine, used to talk about feeling the pain and disappointment of losing, totally embracing it, so that you can carry it with you, understand where you need to improve, and let it drive you forward. This is an opportunity for growth.
Can Seattle Get Back to the Super Bowl?
Q: You mentioned how hard it is to get back to the Super Bowl. We saw it with the Eagles: they won it and didn’t return this year. Could that happen to Seattle too, or do they have what it takes to make another run?
Benjamin Watson: I don’t know the answer to that. I don’t know what everybody’s contract situation is. I assume Darnold’s going to be there. I know some of the young guys on defense, Nick Iman Warrior, I covered him in the SEC when he played at South Carolina. Young player, talented player, going to be a stalwart on that defense for a long time.
I don’t quite know where the other guys stand when it comes to contracts and free agency, and that always plays into it.
On sustaining success:
There’s also the factor of how a team responds to success. Everybody knows this in their own sphere, wherever they work, sometimes the most difficult thing is sustaining success over a long period of time.You think about the Patriots in the early 2000s. You think about the 49ers dynasties, the Steelers, and even in other sports. The hardest thing is coming back in a few months, wiping the slate clean, and saying last year doesn’t matter. We have to be as hungry and as prepared and as tenacious as we were last year in order to make it back this year.
And even if you have the same talent, or perhaps even better talent, that doesn’t mean everything is going to sync together the same way.
On staff turnover after winning:
And then the other factor is that when you win, you lose people. You lose a Kubiak, the offensive coordinator, who may go be a head coach somewhere. You lose an assistant quarterback coach. You lose a DB coach who goes to be a defensive coordinator. All of that adds up.So it’s very difficult to predict.
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