Mason Rudolph Color Rush Jersey from panxing18's blog

”I’m pumped up about it. I’m excited about that challenge Josh Sweat Color Rush Jersey ,” Carroll said Tuesday. ”I’m upset that we have to face it this early. I’d like another six weeks here, that would be nice. But that’s not what this one is. We got to go after it. Nothing’s going to change other than maybe our resolve.”

For just the second time in his eight years in Seattle, Carroll spent Tuesday explaining why the Seahawks were not in the postseason. It’s the first playoff miss for Seattle since the 2011 season and with the rapid rise of division foe Los Angeles indicated – at least for one year – a significant change in the hierarchy of the NFC West.

Injuries played a major role in Seattle’s slide to 9-7. So, too, did inconsistency on offense, continued problems with penalties and salary cap constraints that limited adjustments the Seahawks could make during the season.

It’s likely to be a busy offseason as Seattle attempts to manage its tight cap situation while making key decisions about how to move forward and if it still is a championship contender needing slight tweaks or a major overhaul.

”I think there is a championship team sitting in this meeting room right here,” Carroll said.

Here are some of the issues to know about Seattle’s 2017 season and going into next year:

REDISCOVER THE RUN: Perhaps nothing irritated Carroll more, or had a great impact on the efficiency of the offense, than Seattle’s inability to run. It’s been a staple of Carroll’s program from the day he arrived in Seattle.

This year the Seahawks had one rushing touchdown by a running back. Quarterback Russell Wilson was the leading rusher with 586 yards, 346 more than any other player. Seattle had hopes for promising rookie Chris Carson, but he was sidelined by an ankle injury early in the season and never made it back. The lack of a running game affected Wilson as a passer as well, as defenses didn’t have to commit an extra safety to stopping the run, leading to smaller throwing windows and some tentative decisions by Wilson.

”There are tremendous examples of teams around the league that have turned their fortunes around with a formula that should sound familiar to you: teams running the football, playing good defense and doing the kicking game thing,” Carroll said.

INJURY CONCERNS: Carroll wouldn’t get into specifics, but there is a chance Cliff Avril and Kam Chancellor have played their final games. Avril and Chancellor suffered neck injuries during the season. Carroll said on the radio Tuesday that both would have a ”hard time” playing football again. A couple of hours later, he softened his stance, saying each have quality-of-life decisions to address with their football future.

”Both those guys are marvelous people and competitors and all that. We’d love to see them through the rest of their career. I don’t know what’s going to happen there,” Carroll said.

LEGION OF WHOM: If Chancellor does not return, it could be the start of a major makeover for Seattle’s secondary. Richard Sherman is coming off a torn Achilles tendon and was openly shopped by Seattle last offseason. Earl Thomas is entering the last year of his contract and his actions toward the end of the season indicated a desire to be elsewhere for the 2018 season.

A big key will be if Seattle can re-sign versatile safety Bradley McDougald after he played both free and strong safety this season.

HOME-FIELD AVERAGE: Seattle went 4-4 at home, its first .500 record at CenturyLink Field since 2011. The Seahawks have always thrived at home, but some of their uglier performances this year came in front of their own fans.

OFF THE FIELD: Seattle was among the most active teams in the league with a significant number of players participating in national anthem protests. The protests, on top of the incident Michael Bennett had with police in Las Vegas in August, created a number of unexpected issues.

Carroll said he believed that only once this season – Seattle’s loss at Tennessee – did discussions of off-field issues affect the team’s performance. Seattle had long discussions following comments by President Donald Trump about NFL players and opted to remain in the locker room as a team during the anthem before that game.

”That was an extraordinarily heated time,” Carroll said. ”I think that was a different amount of emotional output that occurred before the game and it looked like it the way we played.”

—

The Los Angeles Angels lost four more players to the disabled list Friday Mason Rudolph Color Rush Jersey , putting the club’s total at a franchise-record 15 players on the DL at one time.

Infielder Zack Cozart went on the DL with a partially dislocated left shoulder, while right-hander Jim Johnson has a lower back strain; right-hander Garrett Richards is nursing a strained left hamstring; and right-hander Nick Tropeano has inflammation in his pitching shoulder.

Meanwhile, Japanese two-way star Shohei Ohtani is taking some one-handed swings as the Angels wait out his sprained elbow to be re-evaluated in a few weeks.

The timeline for Richards, plagued by injuries the past two seasons that limited him to 12 total starts over 2016 and `17, to return is unclear, though manager Mike Scioscia said the injury is considered mild. ”Hamstrings,” he said, ”they’re a different animal.”

Richards left his Wednesday start at Seattle after two innings with tightness in the hamstring, then Cozart went down the next inning diving for a ball and irritated the shoulder. He has played with the injury before, but his shoulder needs to calm down.

With Richards, the Angels won’t take any chances.

”Unfortunately right now we’ve got to take a little half-step back and let it heal,” Scioscia said before his team opened a weekend series at Oakland. ”It was definitely affecting how he was trying to execute pitches the other day. We’re keeping our fingers crossed that it’s not going to be an extended injury.”

Johnson’s back locked up a couple of days ago.

Scioscia said he would do anything to take on all the injuries of his players because he doesn’t have to be feeling good, with the former catcher noting he already has plenty of aches and pains. While the injuries are mounting and the minor leaguers are arriving at a rapid rate to fill big holes, Scioscia said there have been worse times like in recent years when the entire rotation was hurt in a month’s time – that ”is devastating,” he said.

”I don’t know about four guys in one day,” Scioscia said. ”You can absorb the regular players that are out here and there but when you lose the toughest commodity to find is really good starting pitching, that takes a big dent out of what you’re trying to do. That being said, nobody’s going to feel sorry for yourself. We feel we have the guys that will go in there and contribute and keep us going.

”And if we can pitch and have our bullpen hold leads, then we’re going to be fine.”

The Angels called up four right-handed pitchers from Triple-A Salt Lake: Eduardo Paredes, Akeel Morris, Felix Pena and Jake Jewell. Left-hander John Lamb will be called up to start Saturday, meaning the Angels must make another move by designating someone for assignment to clear space on the 40-man roster.

The A’s were the last team with 15 players on the DL at once, in 2016. Los Angeles had just 12 players from the opening day roster on Friday’s active roster.

—