Seahawks traveling to Las Vegas to take on first overall pick Fernando Mendoza in his NFL debut

Seahawks hitting the road to face the Raiders on Sunday in Las Vegas. Drew Locke will get a second start for the Hawks at quarterback, while the Raiders will go with rookie Fernando Mendoza getting his first career start against Seattle. Oh, boy. And joining us now, Fox 13 sports reporter Curtis Crabtree joining us again. Good morning to you. Good morning, Bill. All right, so the Raiders traded Kirk Cousins to the Vikings at the trade deadline. That opened the door for Mendoza, the first overall pick in last year's draft, making his debut against the dark side defense. So welcome to the league, Rook. On top of that, the Raiders have really struggled to run the ball, and they will struggle against Seattle. And so I imagine the Hawks just, what, pin their ears back and go right after the rookie, right? They might not have to. That's the thing. I mean, their defense has been so good against the running game, they can kind of do it with their front four and not much else. And so they might just be able to cause the havoc against Mendoza without sending a whole lot of extra pressure against him. They're very good in that way. Byron Murphy's been terrific at causing problems for opposing run games who are much more productive than the Raiders have been this year. So ultimately, it's going to be a tough task for... For Mendoza in his first start, and as we talked about an hour ago, the last couple guys who've made their first career start against the Mike McDonald Seahawks defense, Max Brosmer and Bo Nix, did not go particularly well for them in those outings. And I think they're going to make it tough on the number one overall pick this weekend. Now, Drew Locke gets another start for the Seahawks, and Locke looked pretty good against the Cardinals. He is dealing with an elbow injury in his throwing arm and also an oblique injury that he suffered last week. But some good news. You were just telling me that Rashid Shaheed is probably back in the lineup for the Hawks this week. And they ran the ball pretty well against Arizona with a healthy Zach Charbonnet and Jadarian Price. And Price is a pretty good pass catcher out of the backfield as well, it turns out. So what are you seeing and what do you hope to see from the Hawks running game moving forward? Yeah, just a quick note on Shaheed. He's been full participant in practice the last couple days, so that's tracking for a guy who can probably get back this week. For the running game, I felt like last game against Arizona was the first time we've kind of seen what they were thinking of for their rushing attack this year. Was Zach Charbonnet back in his second game with Jadarian Price factoring in a little bit more? In fact, their first touchdown drive of the game, Sure. Charbonnet and Price combined for 53 of the 55 yards they gained on the drive between carries and catches out of the backfield. Getting them more involved to take some of the pressure off the quarterback position in Jackson Smith and Jigba, as good as he's been this year, kind of spread the wealth a little bit, would be something that would be a big boost for them if they can continue to do it time after time. And yeah, both those guys seem like they can factor into the passing game as well, in addition to their ability to carry it. Now the Hawks traded for offensive lineman Quentin Nelson ahead of the trade deadline. We saw the Niners add wideout Keenan Allen and defensive lineman DeForest Buckner. That was about it for the NFC West. Did that surprise you that there weren't more moves made? I think the Rams made most of their moves before the season, getting Miles Garrett and getting Aaron Donald back out of retirement. I think they kind of set their path in that regard. I don't know what else the Seahawks really could have done. I think they've got their running game back together now with Charbonnet and Price coming back healthy, so I don't know that a running back was a massive pressing need there. You could make the argument that you could always use another pass rusher, but beyond that, I think the Nelson trade was the one thing that kind of got them set up for the rest of the year, even if he's out in the interim with a knee injury as well. For the 49ers, Their passing game hasn't been much when Mike Evans hasn't been a part of that lineup, so I think trying to supplement that with Keenan Allen was part of the thought process there. And to bring DeForest Buckner back as well, a guy that they're familiar with from the past. He used to be a 49er to help boost them because Nick Bosa's missed time again with injuries. I think those moves made sense for the 49ers, and they've been the class of the NFC, I think, so far this season, and it's going to be up to the rest of the group chasing to try to run them down. I think that bye week next week comes at a pretty good time for the Hawks to heal up a little bit ahead of a huge Niners game, and not to look past the game this week in Vegas, but that Niner game is massive. How much better are the 7-1 Niners after making those deadline moves, and what are you looking forward to with that Niner matchup? I think they're incrementally better. I don't know that they move the needle massively regardless. Wordless. They. They'll help, but I don't know that they're game changers for the 49ers. They were already a good roster to begin with. The Seahawks played them straight up really close the first time they played them. I don't think there's that much difference between the two teams. They just haven't been able to get a couple of the extra victories that the 49ers have so far this year. But ultimately, there's still time for the Seahawks to try to run them down or somebody else. Regardless, once they get to the playoffs, it's a whole new season at that point anyway, even if they're not playing at home to have that advantage if the 49ers close out the division. They're still playing to play for the Seahawks down the stretch here, but they can't give away games like this Raiders game either before that 49ers game comes along. Absolutely. This is a must-have. Curtis Crabtree, thank you so much. Thanks, Bill. We'll chat with you next hour. The Seahawks take on the Raiders this Sunday, 1:05 in the afternoon.