RENTON, Wash. -- Seattle free safety Earl Thomas said he thought the San Francisco 49ers deliberately tried to avoid him last weekend and didn’t run many pass plays over the middle in his direction.
Seahawks’ defensive coordinator Dan Quinn, when told of Thomas’ comments, was asked what he thought of that theory.
“Good idea,” Quinn said with a chuckle.
Cornerback Richard Sherman said he has noticed teams are changing the way they attack the Seattle secondary.
“We’re seeing a lot of adjustments,” Sherman said. “You can’t just play us head-up. That’s playing to our strengths if you play us straight up. If you just bang heads with us, that’s a good matchup for us. Teams are finding ways to get around that and avoid the physicality.”
For the most part, Sherman doesn’t think it’s working.
“We still played good defense [at San Francisco],” Sherman said, and we had a good game.”
Even coming off the 19-17 loss, the Seahawks improved to No. 1 in the league in yards allowed per game at 287.1. They also are first in pass defense, allowing only 175.6 yards a game through the air.
Losing cornerback Brandon Browner and Walter Thurmond hasn’t appeared to hurt the Legion of Boom. Byron Maxwell, who is starting at cornerback now, had an interception that stopped a possible scoring drive for the 49ers. Jeremy Lane had three pass breakups from the nickel back spot Sunday.
‘I think they’ve done great for us,” Carroll said of Maxell and Lane. “Our expectations were they would hold up their end of it, and have done that. The ball is going away from Sherman, so they’re getting some extra turns, but they’re doing a terrific job.”