It’s nice to be right every once in a while, and while saying the Seattle Seahawks were going to blowout the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX wasn’t really the riskiest claim in the world, I’ll still take it. But that’s not exactly what I care about talking about — the real story of the night was the coaching and special teams.

I want to talk about the unsung Seahawks hero, one of the three players who had a serious chance to receive MVP of the Super Bowl: Michael Dickson, #4, punter. If the Seahawks had had an average punter, it would have been a close ball game going into the fourth quarter. But they had Dickson, so it was not.

Over the course of the Super Bowl, Dickson punted over 335 yards, directly causing three dead drives from the Patriots and pushing the Patriots out of opportunities for field goals twice. He dropped three punts within the opposing six yard line, forcing New England quarterback Drake Maye to pass from within his own end zone on three separate occasions, all of which could have turned into safeties. Punting 50 yards with massive amounts of hang time when the Seahawks were up against their own end zone at every opportunity forced the Patriots to start drives from outside of field goal range with bad field position which, on ensuing defensive three and out stops, put the Seahawks within 10 to 15 yards of field goals on their own drives.

The punter, of all players on the Seahawks, was responsible for forcing the Patriots out of position to score around nine points and gave the Seahawks an incredibly advantageous field position for their own 15 yard line from field goals. With a complete dominance in field positioning across the entire game, the special teams for the Seahawks effectively swung the game by around 26 points through the kicking game.

Of course, any discussion of this Super Bowl would be incomplete without talking about the Seattle defense versus the New England offense. Let me start with two clear statements: First, the Seahawks are the best coached defense in football, and second, neither Maye nor Mike Vrabel are that guy.

Seattle’s defense shined this year for its utilization of strong players and a few stars being used effectively and efficiently by an excellent coaching staff. In an interview with USA Today, Defensive Tackle Leonard Williams explained how the ‘Dark Side’ defense makes good players great.

“They coach us all differently,” he said. “They know my skill set is different from Byron Murphy’s skill set, and because of that, they’re not going to treat us like the same person. I’ve been part of certain organizations where they coach everyone in the defensive line room the same. We’re all unique in our own ways. This team does a good job of leaning into our uniqueness and allowing us to let it shine.”

For being the ‘Dark Side’ of the team, the emphasis in scheme and staff is intended to make their players shine brighter.

As for criticism of Mike Vrabel and the Patriots offensive staff: I don’t want to be very harsh on Maye because I really feel like he did what he could do under that scheme.

For most third downs two players were positioned on the outside edges of the Seahawks defensive line, ready to blitz. This is problematic because when the Patriots staff (coach and assistant coach of the year, by the way) do not adjust to this at any point and end up giving up six sacks and forcing Maye to play while being pressured for the entire game. The complete lack of adjustment and ability to plan the game was evident when even on Maye’s best throws, the target would be surrounded by multiple members of the Seahawks secondary and unable to move for any yards after the catch. To call the Patriots offense out-planned and outmatched would be a complete understatement, which any analyst should have seen coming. This kind of completely outmatched line doesn’t just come from player performance, but coaching decisions the New England staff should be ashamed of. Their best plays came from substituting in a sixth offensive lineman, and they proceeded to stop doing it after some of their only positive plays on the night.

Want three key takeaways from the Super Bowl? First, learn to enjoy special teams. Second, the coach of the year is a joke award when it comes to actual schemes. Third, the Patriots rode to the Super Bowl like they historically have off the back of a crumbling, weak division and then had the easiest AFC title game in recent memory and nearly lost it. They walked into a genuine 14-3 juggernaut which earned that record fighting the toughest teams in the league, and somehow a lot of TV analysts gaslit themselves into thinking this would be close.