The budding might of Seahawks TEs Will Dissly and Gerald Everett

When Dee Eskridge got his first touch last season, I was excited. When the rookie got his first contact in the regular season, I almost jumped off the pitch. Using a slightly different formation and design, the team ran a very similar game with almost identical results. You can see the two clips below for comparison.

Dee Eskridge has elite bikes. When he does a jet sweep, he just looks … different. Also kudos to Gerald Everett for the kick-out block that made this game jump for 13 yards. # 1 doesn’t take up a lot of space to work with its turbo button. #Seahawks pic.twitter.com/mvlpKJsKyG

– Corbin K. Smith (@CorbinSmithNFL) September 15, 2021

But as you can probably tell from the tweets above (and the title of this article), this is not about Eskridge. This is about the creation of the impressive duo Will Dissly and Gerald Everett – Tight Ends, Best Friends and Hawks 4 Life (apart from their positional security, I absolutely claim that I have no idea whether the two players are the best or not friends and can do not guarantee that they are Hawks 4 life). And while their pass catching skills may be what gets them the most attention, seeing how they do their part in fueling Eskridge for some big runs is tremendous, especially when they do it with so much enthusiasm.

The first clip shows Dissly leading the attack with Everett by his side as the two of them clear a path so wide that Eddie Lacy could have found some daylight in 2017. While Dissly stands on the sidelines for second, Everett uses his agility on his first step to sell the game design, then uses his push to get outside and put a hat on Julian Blackmon. If Everett doesn’t do this perfectly, this piece won’t start (aside from some heroics by the young speedster Eskridge). But before we move into the present, let’s take a few steps back for a minute.

When Seattle made Will Dissly a fourth round pick in 2018, many of us were obviously happy with the choice of a local dawg, especially one that was seen as a plus-blocking tight-end after college. And then he went ahead and did this.

While Dissly has proven to be a stable and willing blocker, his skill as a receiver has made him popular with all of us and made him an always exciting player in the off-season. While his career seemed derailed by some very unfortunate and brutal injuries in consecutive seasons, he took a monumental step in 2020 and played all year. While he took a back seat in his role as a receiver – in part due to the confusing decision to sign and show Greg Olsen (which admittedly helped keep Dissly fresh all season) – he continued to display solid blocking traits and one eerie ability to open up while running routes. And that was under Brian Schottenheimer.

Now, under the offensive guidance of Shane Waldron and paired with the explosive and savvy Gerald Everett, Dissly plans to take another step in her fourth year. And he could finally be paired with the right combination of teammates and coaching to do so. While the Rams tight ends under McVay weren’t overly active in his first couple of seasons as HC, they’ve been upping the ante in the past two years, ranking 5th and 7th in the total yards of tight ends StatMuse, respectively. For reference, Seattle was the bottom half of the league every season for the same period except 2017, where they barely crawled into the middle of the field. And then they went and signed this guy.

This game was canceled due to a formation problem. But nice design, nice work by OL and what sportiness from Gerald Everett pic.twitter.com/l8kDQtPHur

– Rapinas do Mar (Cortes) (@cortesrapinas) September 12, 2021

While this game has been recalled for uncovered tackle, Everett’s athleticism and blast stand out as pass catchers. Gerald ran a 4.62 forty and was recognized in his NFL draft profile for “size, speed, and tremendous follow-up potential”. Compare that to Dissly, who scored a 4.87-forty run, and you can see the smash-and-dash potential of this position group. Both players bring unique sets of tools and you can see their two skills in the game below.

Great game design and smooth execution lead to six for Seattle. DK Metcalf is aligned far left and pulls – together with Penny from the backcourt – three of the Colts defenders in their direction and opens the middle of the field. Will Dissly, the aforementioned jack-of-all-trades, pulls two Colts while driving a shake route into the end zone. With Bobby Okereke and Kenny Moore II on Dissly, Tyler Lockett does Tyler Lockett and does a cute double move that all-pro Darius Leonard hesitates just long enough for Wilson to find a cross-center Everett for an easy six. Games like these get me excited not just for the focus of this article, but for Waldron’s offensive in general: simple but deceptive concepts, schemes that create mismatches and wide-open receivers, and the use of pre-snap alignments to undermine the offensive Keeping control and defenses on your heels. This strategy sounds simple by design, but requires precise execution. And the Hawks may have found the right combination of staff and coaching to pitch an offensive that can embody a playbook that is both aggressive and sustainable.

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Of course, Seattle didn’t exactly set the world on fire after a week and amassed a total of 57 yards from their talented duo. But I don’t think this one cumulative statistic tells the whole story; Russell Wilson found Gerald Everett for six, and Will Dissly made it happen:

If you’re like me, this clip has been rerun in your household for much of the past week. Archive this under the Instant Highlight Hall of Fame and share a toast to Kam Chancellor’s hit on Vernon Davis and Marshawn Lynch’s stiff arm on Tracy Porter. While the final moments were obviously much, much bigger due to the games they were played in, I hope that as the season progresses and the games intensify, Dissly will have many more opportunities to end this soul-wrecking train. Last but not least, the Hawks took a small but decisive step this off-season; After years of trying to match an aging veteran with a young TE corps (Ed Dickson, Greg Olsen), the front office may see the value of a younger but still seasoned player (Everett was drafted a year before Dissly and is two years older ). With the team that will face the Tennessee Titans on Sunday – which left zero receptions on four goals in their otherwise demoralizing loss to the Arizona Cardinals – the Seahawks and their dynamic duo will have the opportunity to showcase and build on their talents again her budding chemistry, this time – for the first time – before the twelve.