Seahawks linebacker K.J. Wright has been limited to just three

games played this season due to knee injuries that have keep sidelined for most the year.With two weeks remaining in the regular season Patrick Kerney Color Rush Jersey , Wright is nearing a possible return to the field and the Seahawks are hopeful he’ll have a chance to return to the lineup this Sunday night against the Kansas City Chiefs.“K.J.’s going to practice this week and we’ll see how he does,” head coach Pete Carroll said on Monday.Wright injured his knee in pregame warmups before the team’s preseason game in Minnesota in August. He missed the first six games of the season before returning after the team’s bye week to play in the next three games against the Detroit Lions, Los Angeles Chargers and Los Angeles Rams. However, Wright was again sidelined in the Rams game as the knee continued to be problematic.After being away from the team two weeks ago to seek additional treatment, Wright was able to return to limited participation in practice at the end of last week. Wright responded well to the workload and is expected to do more this week.“He did really well. It’s all positive right now,” Carroll said.“The ramping up has worked just fine and he’s ready to go (in practice). We’re thinking if the week goes well, he’s got a chance to play – which he’s really excited about, we’ll see what happens. But we really won’t know until the day we go and then the next day and the next day as we know. We’ll keep our fingers crossed for him.”Seattle has used four different players at Wright’s weak-side linebacker spot this season in trying to cover his absence. Mychal Kendricks, Austin Calitro, Barkevious Mingo and Shaquem Griffin have all taken snaps at the spot with Wright sidelined. On Tuesday I took a look at what the Carolina Panthers were doing defensively in order to slow down the running game of the Seattle Seahawks early in the Week 12 matchup, and this short piece is to show exactly how simple the fix was for the Seattle offense. Very quickly, however, this piece can also illustrate the value of the scripting in the early part of the game. Specifically Germain Ifedi Color Rush Jersey , on the first possession the Seahawks went three and out, but those three offensive plays all came out of different formations. Then on their second offensive possession Seattle gained a single first down before being forced to punt from deep in their own territory. On the second possession Seattle ran four offensive plays, and those plays were run from three distinct personnel alignments. Of those three distinct personnel alignments, one was unique over the first two possessions, while the other two were repeats of alignments the offense had used on its first possession. Thus, by the time the Seahawks offense had run a total of seven plays, patterns started to emerge in what the Panthers were doing defensively. Here is a table that shows some basic data of the Seattle offense charted from the first four possessions of the game, during which the offense scored three points. Seahawks first four offensive possessions charted for box counts by offensive personnelDrive number- Offensive Play NumberOffensive formationOffensive Blockers in BoxDefensive Men in BoxDrive number- Offensive Play NumberOffensive formationOffensive Blockers in BoxDefensive Men in BoxFor ease of understanding, in the Offensive formation column, the letter in parentheses after the TE indicates whether the tight end lined up in line with their hand in the dirt (I) or whether they were standing up in a two-point stance more like a wide receiver (O). The Defensive Men in Box Column shows two pieces of data. The first is the number of men the defense showed in the box initially, and then in parentheses is the number of men in the box at the snap. If the letters “ns” are noted in the parentheses, it means the defense did not shift prior to the snap. Thus, by the end of the second possession Marshawn Lynch Color Rush Jersey , and certainly by the time the offense had run its first ten plays, it should have been apparent to the Hawks coaching staff that when they lined up in 11 personnel (1 running back, 1 tight end and 3 wide receivers) with the tight end in line as a blocker, Carolina would sneak a man into the box just before the snap. So, what did the Hawks do from there? Well, it’s readily apparent from the remainder of the table that the Hawks pretty quickly went away from that particular alignment. After using three wide receivers and a tight end on the end of the line of scrimmage six times on the first ten plays, the offense showed that alignment just twice more over the next eleven plays, and one of those plays was 2nd & 18 from their own three yard line, which means it’s likely that everyone on the planet was expecting a running play. And after that fourth possession of the game, which ended in a three and out and a punt from their own end zone, the Hawks largely went away from the specific alignment from 11 personnel on which the Panthers were using the pre-snap shift. Here’s a look at the alignment and personnel of the next fourteen plays the offense ran, of which only two came from the formation on which the Carolina defense used a late shift (and the Panthers game plan appears to have called for the team to stop using the shift in the red zone, which is where one of these two plays in question took place). Formation and alignment of fifth and sixth offensive possessions by the SeahawksDrive number- Offensive Play NumberOffensive formationOffensive Blockers in BoxDefensive Men in BoxDrive number- Offensive Play NumberOffensive formationOffensive Blockers in BoxDefensive Men in BoxAnd that was it - by changing the formations they were using Earl Thomas III Color Rush Jersey , the Seahawks made the pre-snap reads that are so vital to their offense easier for Russell Wilson, and the rest of the offense.The cat and mouse between Seattle offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer and Carolina defensive coordinator Eric Washington continued through the remainder of the second half, as after the Hawks appear to have figured out how to avoid the Panthers using a late shift the Panthers switched up what they keyed on. Thus, Schotty picked and probed how Carolina would react, and appears to have found that the defense treated a tight end in a two point stance differently than a tight end in a three point stance. Thus, the Seahawks began to show a lot of 11 personnel with the tight end on the line of scrimmage, but in a two point stance. The Panthers appear to have treated these as two completely different formations, and initially the defense responded differently. In short, the Carolina defense looked at thisas a unique and different formation than this:So the Seahawks switched how they were lining up their tight ends, using them primarily in two point stances as opposed to a three point stance. The Carolina defense then seems to have adjusted to base the defense on where the tight end lined up on the field rather than the location and stance being used. And thus the game of cat and mouse continued through the end of the game, until the Graham Gano missed his field goal and Sebastian Janikowski made his. Period, the end. Game over. Victory Seahawks.