Good-bye, Mr. Bates

For most of the season, I excoriated the playcalling of offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates.

His default mode was predictable, calling a handoff to Marshawn Lynch on seemingly every first down. Exactly what the defense expected. Typical result: Stuffed for no gain.

His changeup was even worse, though: throwing a fade on third and one. Typical result: incompletion.

Seattle had one of the league's worst offenses. Again.

But let us acknowledge the handicaps Bates faced.

Offensive line coach Alex Gibbs retired before the regular season began, but after his philosophy had dictated some questionable personnel decisions (e.g., cutting Mansfield Wrotto). Art Valero came in at the last minute to try to make it work. Injuries and underperformance required Seattle to try ten different offensive line combinations over the course of the season. No wonder our running game was so bad.

It would have been worse had we not acquired Marshawn Lynch. Since our O-Line couldn't find any daylight, we needed a beastly runner who could make some of his own.

GM John Schneider and Coach Pete Carroll dismantled Seattle's receiving corps, purging last year's best receivers and gambling on unproven wideouts. They refused to pay Nate Burleson, encouraging him to escape in free agency. Then, they cut TJ Houshmandzadeh, paying him $6 million to play for Baltimore. Finally, they traded Deion Branch back to the Patriots.

It took time for Mike Williams and Ben Obomanu to develop into serviceable starters. Deon Butler began to emerge, but then was lost to injury. Golden Tate simply disappointed. We needed to sign Brandon Stokley to find a reliable slot receiver.

Bates may have proposed signing Stokley, since he worked with the wideout in Denver. But it is hard to blame him for the underperformance of our receiving corps. Kippy Brown is the wide receivers coach, and he hasn't been fired, yet.

As offensive coordinator, it was Bates' job to make the most of what we had, and this is where he struggled.

For most of the season, he failed to adapt his playcalling to the team's limited resources. His predictable playcalling made it easy for opposing defenses to shut down our feeble ground game. His desire to throw deep set up Hasselbeck to throw a lot of interceptions.

Late in the season, Bates seemed to hit his stride. In the last few games, he installed new formations and new plays that befuddled opposing defenses.

In the regular season finale against St. Louis, he crafted an offensive game plan that fit Charlie Whitehurst, taking advantage of his mobility, and allowing him to conduct a patient, clock-chewing ball control offense.

The next week, in the wild card game, Bates cleverly exploited the weaknesses of a Saints secondary that had allowed only 12 touchdown passes during the regular season. Hasselbeck shredded New Orleans for four passing touchdowns.

Last week, in Chicago, Bates called a remarkably good game. His original plan relied heavily on tight ends, but a concussion subtracted John Carlson from the lineup after our first offensive play, and an injury hobbled our backup tight end. Reduced to a mere corner of his original play sheet, Bates nevertheless called a good game. Hasselbeck threw the ball accurately, and our receivers got open, but they simply couldn't catch the ball. Again, if we're going to blame a coach for that, it should be the position coach, Kippy Brown, and not the offensive coordinator.

Before those last three games, I would have agreed with Bates' firing.

Now, I'm not sure.