Boye Mafe Shows Elite Speed

After Samuel drifted past Mafe to get open initially, Purdy lofted a pass towards Samuel, and because the ball was slightly underthrown, safety Julian Love misjudged it and failed to either break up the pass or make the hit on Samuel, leaving the veteran free to race down the left sideline.

Mafe immediately gave chase, and while he wasn’t quite able to get Samuel down, the 261-pound edge rusher did reach a top speed of 21.74 miles per hour, which according to NFL Next Gen Stats was the fastest speed by a front seven defensive player on a play from scrimmage over the past two seasons.

Again, that’s little consolation after a big play that contributed to a loss, but it did back up something Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald said following the loss, which is that while the team isn’t doing nearly enough to win games, the effort is there. And in a way, that play was a microcosm of that point. Samuel shouldn’t have been that open, and Love should have made a play to limit the damage, but even in a very negative play, some serious effort showed up.

“There’s things that are really good that we can build off of foundationally, effort wise, physicality, intent, energy wise,” Macdonald said Monday. “All of that is positive. But there’s too many things right now that are costing us football games that we can’t do.”