5 Biggest Obstacles the Seattle Seahawks Face to Repeating as Super Bowl Champs

There was no stopping the Seattle Seahawks last season in their quest to bring the Pacific Northwest its first major sports championship since the 1979 Seattle SuperSonics. However, in order to repeat, the Seahawks do face some major roadblocks.

After acquiring its first playoff win over the Carolina Panthers last Saturday, Seattle is now two wins away from becoming the first back-to-back champions in the NFL since the 2003-04 New England Patriots. They've already hit a milestone in winning a playoff game the season after winning the Super Bowl, which also hadn't happened since that Patriots team.

Although there are obstacles in the way of a "Re-Pete," this is nothing new for these Seahawks. All season, they have overcome adversity in the form of injuries, occasionally poor offensive execution and controversial reports out of the locker room. Despite that, here they are—back in the NFC Championship Game at CenturyLink Field.

They have a chance to get back to the Super Bowl in front of the 12th Man.

Many of the same problems that have plagued Seattle all season are what stand in the way of their trip to Glendale, Arizona, though. If any one of these issues—which Seattle has overcome in its seven-game win streak—rears its ugly head against the Green Bay Packers or the AFC champion, it will be costly.

The Seahawks are about the healthiest they have been all season. However, they are still missing some key cogs to their defense, and several players are only now getting back to full strength.

For Seattle, possibly the most important thing to happen was the Arizona Cardinals' collapse, which allowed the Seahawks to make up a three-game deficit in the NFC West and eventually clinch the No. 1 seed, home-field advantage and a bye in the Wild Card Round. That bye week allowed Seattle's banged-up players, such as Kam Chancellor, Bobby Wagner, Byron Maxwell and Max Unger, to get 100 percent healthy or close to it.

Unger played for the first time in six weeks against the Carolina Panthers. Maxwell had played sparingly toward the end of the season and missed the Carolina game with an illness but is expected back for the NFC Championship Game. Wagner and Chancellor had both battled injuries during the regular season but are now both seemingly at full health, helping turn the defense back into last year's form.

Heck, the Seahawks might be healthier than the Green Bay Packers and their hobbled quarterback, Aaron Rodgers. But by no means are they at full health. They lost rookie wide receiver Paul Richardson last week, just as he was coming into his own and developing into a favorite target of Russell Wilson.

Nose tackle Brandon Mebane has been on injured reserve since tearing his hamstring against the New York Giants in Week 10. He played a key role in the run defense—possibly the most important one. In the game after his injury, Kansas City Chiefs running back Jamaal Charles gashed the Seattle defense for 159 yards. That was also the last time the Seahawks lost a football game.

Since then, Jordan Hill had stepped up at defensive tackle in place of Mebane. He recorded 5.5 sacks in the final six games of the season. But he went on injured reserve after pulling a calf muscle against the St. Louis Rams in the final week of the regular season.

If Rodgers isn't healthy enough to play like the elite quarterback he is, Green Bay might be smart to attack the Seahawks defense with a healthy dose of Eddie Lacy. Last week, the Panthers rushed for 132 yards and 4.4 yards per carry against Seattle.

Confidence. Swagger. Trash-talking.

Just some of the essential elements to the Seahawks' first Super Bowl win last season. But can a team get too confident in itself? The Seahawks might have gotten to that point after winning the championship.

The start of the 2014 season just wasn't the same as the magical run the 2013 team went on. Something was wrong. It wasn't a cohesive unit anymore.

Then Earl Thomas spoke up. The Seahawks dominated the hobbled Arizona Cardinals after Thomas delivered the harsh truth to the team and some key players held a closed-doors meeting. Everything was back on track.

It still is. Seattle hasn't lost since then and looks every bit as good and cohesive as the 2013 championship squad. If you think the Seahawks are taking Aaron Rodgers' calf injury for granted, just take a look at Thomas' comments earlier this week.

“I’m not buying into this leg issue,” Thomas said on Thursday, via Stephen Cohen of SeattlePI.com. “I’m not buying into it. I saw him scramble close to the goal line on the Cowboys, so he’s not fooling me with that.”

It doesn't sound like Seahawks will fall victim to any hubris leading up to Sunday's showdown against the Packers, but every team that operates with this kind of swagger has to worry about it.

Among some of the misconceptions about the Seahawks is that their offensive line doesn't perform up to standard. By no means is it as dominant as the Dallas Cowboys or New England Patriots' O-line, but the group does exactly what position coach Tom Cable asks of it.

Are the penalties frustrating? Absolutely. Could the line be more consistent? For sure. Is it the weakest area on the team? Probably.

But in actuality, Seattle's offensive line is one of the best run-blocking units in the NFL. Marshawn Lynch has earned his title of "Beast Mode" and all of his accolades, but his offensive line deserves some recognition, as well. According to Football Outsiders, the Seahawks have the No. 4 run-blocking line in the NFL. 

SBNation Seahawks blog, Field Gulls, breaks down how tight ends play into the success of the run game here. It's interesting stuff.

However, when it comes to pass blocking, the Seahawks are among the worst in the league. Seemingly every other snap, Russell Wilson is under duress and scrambling for his life. No other quarterback in the NFL could have led the Seahawks to this much success, almost exclusively because of Wilson's Houdini-esque escapes from pressure.

While Football Outsiders ranks the Seahawks' run blocking highly, the same can't be said of their pass-blocking. Seattle has an adjusted sack rate of 8.7 percent, eighth-worst in the league. The stat takes into account how often a team passes the ball, but it doesn't account for a quarterback who scrambles out of pressure as much as Wilson does. The Seahawks would almost certainly rank lower than they already do if that were the case.

It might surprise some of you, but Seattle actually has one of the most efficient offenses in football. According to Football Outsiders, it ranks fifth in weighted offense and offensive DVOA. The Seahawks are 10th in drive success rate (DSR) at .716.

None of those numbers seems to indicate any issues here, right? Wrong.

For unclear reasons, Darrell Bevell's offense consistently stalls when it enters the red zone. Whether it's due to sacks, costly penalties, turnovers or something else, the Seahawks have troubles putting the ball in the end zone from inside the 20-yard line.

Red-zone efficiency numbers can be deceiving because they typically take field goals into account. And three points are undeniably better than zero. But three points are also undeniably worse than seven.

And inside the red zone, the Seahawks were the third-worst playoff team (behind only the Panthers and Cardinals, who were quarterbacked by a third-stringer who hadn't thrown a touchdown pass before this season) in red-zone touchdown percentage. 

Seattle puts six on the board only about 50 percent of the time it has the ball inside the 20-yard line. That's 21st in the entire league and the worst among the remaining playoff teams. New England leads the group at an even 60 percent, then Green Bay at 58.21 percent and Indianapolis at 54.41 percent.

If any quarterback beats the Seahawks in Seattle, it's going to be Aaron Rodgers, the best gunslinger in the National Football League.

Yes, the Packers only put a 16-spot on the scoreboard in Week 1, but Rodgers hardly was terrible. He was 23-of-33 for 189 yards (minus 14 yards on three sacks), with a touchdown and an interception.

He can play better, which could be the key here. Seattle came out firing in Week 1. From the start, there was no question who was winning that game. The same was true of San Francisco's regular-season trip up to the Emerald City last season.

But lo and behold, that NFC championship matchup was one for the ages, and Colin Kaepernick had a much-improved performance. 

The two quarterbacks had eerily similar stat lines in their regular-season games in Seattle. In the 19-17 loss, Kaepernick went 15-of-29 for 175 yards (minus 20 on two sacks), one touchdown and one interception.

And in the NFC Championship Game a year ago, Kaepernick almost put the 49ers on his back to lead them to a win in Seattle. The Seahawks were able to hold on, but expect a similar bounce-back performance from Rodgers on Sunday.

No matter the severity of his calf injury, a quarterback like Rodgers rarely has back-to-back subpar games against the same team.

It has to be taken into account that Rodgers is the first elite quarterback Seattle has faced in a long time. We shouldn't discount the defense's streak of allowing only eight points per game during its seven-game win streak, but those victories did come against Drew Stanton, Colin Kaepernick (twice), Mark Sanchez, Ryan Lindley, Shaun Hill and Cam Newton.

After the three-game stretch to start the season against Rodgers, Peyton Manning and Phillip Rivers, the Seahawks haven't faced a quarterback of that caliber. There's no reason to expect them to come out unprepared, but Rodgers and the Green Bay offense could provide a rude awakening.