Death of a Rivalry

Last week on Thursday Night Football, the Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco 49ers met in Santa Clara. The loser of this game would occupy sole possession of last place in the NFC West. That's right, It's week seven of the 2015 season. And these two are at the bottom of their division.

My, how quickly things change. We aren't two full years removed from Richard Sherman's attempt to turn the NFL into a WWE hype-show:

This is by far, the greatest postgame, on-field interview of my generation and capped off an amazing NFC Championship game. Seattle did not lead that game until the fourth quarter, going up 20-17. 49ers quarterback, Collin Kaepernick turned the ball over three times in that quarter and the Seahawks fumbled two plays in a row, including a crazy and controversial one involving Navorro Bowman's gruesome knee injury (only an omen of things to come). The game ended on Sherman's memorable deflection against Michael Crabtree in the end zone, which Malcolm Smith intercepted to seal the deal.  

And then that interview happened. And we all thought we would be blessed to these Seahawks vs. 49ers matchups at least twice a year, and probably another one in the postseason. These guys hated each other. Pete Carroll and Jim Harbaugh hated each other. And they both had two smash mouth defenses that loved to hit each other and talk trash. 

But this is the NFL. There is no time for team rivalries to blossom. There can only be a few teams sustaining success at the top. Even if your team make the playoffs multiple years in a row, if they don't punch a ticket to the Super Bowl, the team will eventually get blown up. For the Seahawks to go on a two year run of NFC dominance, the 49ers had to fail. And their roster was too talented and their coach too abrasive for the franchise to sustain a drought like that.   

In the two years since that game, the 49ers are a shell of themselves. The Khaki Pants are in Ann Arbor now coaching college games. He's replaced with Jim Tomsula who, honestly, looks like a Ron Jeremy that made better life choices. He's not exactly a menacing figure. Also gone is that intimidating defense. Patrick Willis, Aldon Smith, Justin Smith, and Chris Borland are all gone. Frank Gore, Crabtree, Mike Iupati and Anthony Davis are gone on offense. And Kaepernick might as well be a different quarterback. He didn't rush for a single yard on Thursday, and only threw for 124 yards. 

San Francisco has lost all its playmakers that matched the Seahawks in their power and talent. They might have replaced a couple of those key parts, but the bad-blood isn't there anymore. This is just a typical divisional game. 

Thursday's game was over in a matter of minutes. On their first drive, the Seahawks slammed Marshawn Lynch down the now-soft 49ers defense en route to an opening drive touchdown. And the 49ers never responded. In the first half, Russell Wilson hit Tyler Lockett for a 43-yd touchdown pass. Kaepernick finished the first half with 44 total passing yards. San Francisco managed just three points all night. Michael Bennett ended the game with 3.5 sacks against Kaepernick and constantly terrorized him. I swear he was wearing a bib by the end of the night.     

The sad truth of this rivalry is that it existed more in our minds and in the talk than it did on the field. It was refreshing to have a rivalry between two football teams that didn't involve debates about legacy or quarterbacks (here are my thoughts on Manning vs. Bardy by the way, shameless plug and whatnot). Since the Seahawks drafted Wilson in 2012, Seattle is 6-2 against San Francisco and have now won four in a row. In that span, the 49ers have never scored more than 19 points.

Both teams have to have success for the rivalry to be great. It's why I, a born-and-raised Clevelander, have no real reasons to hate the Pittsburgh Steelers, other than it being my birth-right. They have always won and my Browns have always lost. I respect them for winning. They've never spoiled anything for my team.

Watching Thursday's game wasn't fun. I couldn't feel the energy that was expected for this clash. The worst part about it all is that their rivalry is ending before it really got started. The 49ers are going to spend the next couple years rebuilding, and the Seahawks are showing serious cracks in their armor. We can lament the loss, because for a couple brief seasons we had a football rivalry that was violent and so old-school it was refreshing. At least they gave us that perfect 30-second clip at the apex of their hatred. But I'm pronouncing it dead as of Oct. 22, 2015.