The Seattle Seahawks brought in Duane Brown to help a porous blocking group, but it's not the only move the team will make to help a woefully underperforming running game.
Pete Carroll partly blamed the employment of a running back committee as one reason his tailbacks can't find footing. The coach said he'd like to see one back establish a groove.
"I don't feel like we have been in a rhythm," Carroll said, via the Seattle Times. "I think I've held them back a little bit by spreading it around quite a bit and trying to figure that out. So as we zero in the second half [of the season] hopefully we are going to make some headway."
And who has the arrow stopped on this week against the Washington Redskins?
"Going to see a lot of Eddie this week," Carroll said.
"We're going to start with Eddie and let him go a little bit and see where it goes from there," said offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell added.
The Seahawks rushing attack has been painful to watch, especially since Chris Carson went down with a season-ending injury. Seattle is earning 97.6 yards rushing per game. A good chunk of that is from Russell Wilson. For the season, Seattle running backs have total 449 rushing yards, or 64.1 yards per game. The struggles have been particularly bad since Carson broke his leg in Week 4. Despite missing the past three games, Carson still leads the Seahawks in yards (208) and attempts (208).
It appears Carroll & Co. have decided they are adding to the problems by swapping in Lacy, Thomas Rawls and J.D. McKissic. You could understand, however, why they have been shuffling the deck in hopes one back will catch a hot streak. Neither Lacy nor Rawls has shown any burst in minimal chances. In Sunday's shootout win over Houston, each back had six carries. They combined for -1 yard.
The team hopes that riding Lacy will provide some consistency.
"It's kind of hard to go in and come out and go in and come out because you never really establish a rhythm," Lacy said. "So if that changes at some point I don't know. But in order to get going you definitely need to find a rhythm ... You're never really in long enough to establish anything so just in and out a lot. So kind of hard to establish that."
Given what Lacy has put on tape behind a heretofore leaky offensive line, color us skeptical he'll hold down the gig long-term. Lacy shows little pop and struggles to shed tacklers. In five games played, the 27-year-old has a total of three carries earning more than 10 yards this season, with a long of 19.
If the veteran struggles early Sunday against a banged-up Redskins defensive front, it'll be back to the drawing board for Bevell.