Error-filled Seahawks have no answer for 49ers -- yet again -- in 3rd straight loss, 36-24

Tyler Lockett grabbed the top of his helmet with two hands.

Geno Smith just bowed his head. After the game, he was as short and terse as the 33-year-old veteran has been in his three seasons as Seattle’s quarterback.

“We didn’t control the ball. We didn’t control the clock. Turned the ball over. Had the penalties,” Smith said. “All the things we talk about every week.

“Work harder. Be better.”

Mike Macdonald paced the sideline with both arms firmly across and pressed against his chest.

They had no answers. No one with Seattle did against San Francisco. Yet again.

It’s a football truism as old as the ball itself: Turnovers kill. They left the Seahawks dead against the 49ers. Yet again.

Seattle had scored 14 unanswered points, turning its 23-3 disaster into a 23-17 thriller. The Seahawks had the ball and momentum following two consecutive completions and first downs deep in Seattle territory with 8 minutes left. On first down Smith had good pass protection and a formed pocket, a rarity for him against San Francisco the last three years.

But he threw late over the middle to DK Metcalf. Metcalf saw cornerback Renardo Green jump his crossing route, so he ran deep behind Green. Smith apparently didn’t see Metcalf’s adjustment. He threw it shorter. Green intercepted the pass in front of Metcalf and returned the ball to the Seattle 15.

The 49ers turned that into Brock Purdy’s third touchdown pass of the night, the second one to George Kittle. Seattle’s third turnover turned a taut game into a 29-17 lead for San Francisco in the Seahawks’ eventual, 36-24 loss at frenzied Lumen Field.

Smith, the NFL’s leader in completions, attempts and passing yards coming in, completed 30 of 52 passes for 312 yards. He threw a touchdown pass and two interceptions.

He was in no mood to talk about his one toward Metcalf (three catches, 11 targets, 48 yards), who was one of the first players to exit the locker room following the game.

“It was an interception, man. We all saw it,” Smith said.

“Bad play by me.”

All-around bad play again by the Seahawks (3-3). They finished three games in 10 days — and lost all three of them.

They lost for the sixth consecutive time to San Francisco, the kings of the NFC West they must beat to get to where they want to go.

They remain a long way from there.

“Look, it stings,” said Macdonald, the rookie head coach and NFL’s youngest at age 37. “It stings to have lost three in a row, to lose it against your division rival at home, primetime, such a great environment. Guys fought their tails off down to the last minute.

“But we’re not playing well enough to beat the team we needed to beat.”

Macdonald’s defense that allowed 185 yards rushing by New England in week two and 175 yards by the New York Giants last weekend surrendered 228(!) more on the ground to the 49ers. And San Francisco was using third- and fourth-string running backs because of injuries to Christian McCaffrey and, during this game, Jordan Mason.

The Seahawks fired Pete Carroll and hired Macdonald, the maestro coordinator of the Baltimore Ravens’ top-ranked defense last season, to fix this. Seattle was 30th overall in total defense and 31st against the run last, playoff-less season.

They are as bad to worse right now.

“It’s guys getting out of their gaps, second level not fitting correctly, and not getting it on the ground in the third level,” Macdonald said. “That’s what’s going on.”

Fourth-stringer Isaac Guerendo romped for 100 yards, including a 76-yard romp past out-of-position Seahawks on the first play after Seattle had closed to 29-24 with 1:44 left. Kyle Juszczyk then ran 6 yards for the score that clinched it for San Francisco (3-3).

Safety Rayshawn Jenkins watched Guerendo romp right past him on the clinching run.

“It just comes down to discipline,” Jenkins said inside a library-quiet Seahawks locker room after the game. “Run fits. Knowing what you need to do. Having your eyes right.”

The Seahawks thought they had a reviving touchdown of 52 yards on a rainbow pass from Smith to Metcalf down the middle of the field. But at the snap, running back Kenneth Walker was still walking out in motion from the backfield to far left wide receiver as Tyler Lockett was still stepping into his spot in the slot. The officials called two men moving at the snap with getting set as a penalty, for illegal shift. But Lockett was set. Only Walker was still drifting. Instead of a 29-24 game with 5 minutes, it was third and 10.

By the time the Seahawks did score to end that drive, on Smith’s fourth-down pass to Tyler Lockett to make it 29-24, 1:44 remained. Seattle lost 3 minutes of game time on the penalty.

The 49ers made the clock a moot point on the next play. Guerendo, a rookie from Louisville, took off on his 76-yard run past safety Rayshawn Jenkins and other Seahawks.

“You can’t have 10 people communicating and doing the same thing (then) that one off. It’s been killing us,” Pro Bowl safety Julian Love said. “I take that is on me. I got to communicate to the people who need to be in the right spots so they can just do their jobs. I have to take a bigger step in communication and leadership to try to get guys going in the right way. Guys want to play fast, guys want to make plays.

“That last play (Guerendo’s 76-yard run) we had a chance there, and just a little bit miscommunication and mis-fits.”

No, he didn’t say they are misfits.

The Seahawks fell into a first-place tie with the 49ers in a division they led by two games a little over two weeks ago. They now have 10 days, the “mini bye” following the rushed Thursday night game, until their next one. That’s Oct. 20 at Atlanta.

“We need to get better at a lot of things,” said Smith, who has six touchdown passes and six interceptions in six games.

“That’s the reality.”

Macdonald said he is going to assess how he and his new staff are coaching the players during this mini-bye, the weekend the players have off before beginning preparations Monday for the Atlanta game.

“The mentality always has to be ‘Hey let’s move forward, attack this thing. And let’s fight like hell to make it right,’” Macdonald said. “That’s the message to the guys.

“There is no novel idea, but that’s just got to be the mentality.”

Laviska Shenault’s jolt

One of the Seahawks’ lone bright spots of the first 2 1/2 quarters came from a player who contributed to their awful first half: Laviska Shenault atoned for his earlier fumble by returning a 49ers kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown. He broke three tackles to do it.

That made it 23-10, immediately following a George Kittle touchdown catch that gave San Francisco a 20-point lead.

The Seahawks defense got a stop aided by a Niners holding penalty on the ensuing possession. Smith and the Seahawks faced a third and 8 from their own 21. Right tackle Stone Forsythe got away with pushing his hand into the facemask of San Francisco edge rusher Nick Bosa. If detected it would have been a penalty. As that happened, Smith completed a 37-yard pass to Lockett down the right sideline.

That set up Walker’s 1-yard touchdown run out of I formation behind tight end/blocking back Brady Russell.

Seattle was suddenly down only 23-17.

Seahawks’ ugly half

Smith began the game 4 for 9 passing with an interception overthrowing Lockett while getting hit by Bosa inside the San Francisco 5-yard line to end Seattle’s first drive of the game. That was a passer rating of a meager 24.1.

Bosa, San Francisco’s All-Pro defensive end, pushed Forsythe, Seattle’s third-string right tackle, into the quarterback throughout much of the game.

Offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb took blame for Walker, a 1,000-yard rusher two seasons ago, getting just five carries in 58 offensive plays last weekend in Seattle’s home loss to the New York Giants. As expected, Grubb ran Walker early and often Thursday.

He had eight carries in the first 20 offensive plays — but for only 20 yards.

Walker finished with 14 carries for 32 yards. As it has for three years now, San Francisco’s defensive line overwhelmed the Seahawks’ offensive line. Seattle rushed 20 times for 52 yards, just 2.6 yards per carry.

“We certainly tried,” Macdonald said.

“It’s really a team stat, because if you’re behind multiple scores deep into the second half you’re not going to be able to run the ball. It’s just the way it goes.

“So we’re going to keep working on it. Finding our identity. I mean, that’s one on the list of things that we’re going to be attacking over the next week.”

For the second consecutive game, Metcalf was angrily gesturing and yelling at wide receivers coach Frisman Jackson on the bench following a failed offensive possession. That happened in the first quarter Thursday.

With 2:33 remaining in the second quarter, the total yards were San Francisco 244, Seattle 74. The first downs were San Francisco 10, Seattle two. The Niners had run 32 offensive plays to the Seahawks’ 18. Seattle had committed the game’s only two turnovers.

And the 49ers led 16-0.

It got so bad for the Seahawks in the opening half, when Shenault took a knee on the 49ers kickoff into the end zone after upping the lead to 13-0, for a touchback, the home fans gave a mocking, Bronx cheer.

That is, the home fans that didn’t sell their tickets in the 100, field level to 49ers fans.

All the time--then, no time

Seattle’s time management failed, and so did the Seahawks to end the disastrous first half.

The offense was taking its time on its half of the field with 2:00 left down 16-0, not wanting to give the 49ers back the ball with time remaining to score yet again before halftime. But then Smith connected for 19 yards to Jaxon Smith-Njigba, with the last year’s first-round pick running for the last yards. Instead of rushing to the line, Seattle took 36 seconds to snap the ball on first down.

The Seahawks let another 38 seconds elapse after a pass for 1-yard to Walker and before they snapped the ball on an incomplete pass.

Then they used their first time out following that incomplete pass, before a third and 9.

A completion of 17 yards to Smith-Njigba on the receiver’s deft toe tap inside the left sideline on his leaping catch moved the ball to the San Francisco 31. After a 9-yard pass over the middle to Noah Fant, Seattle called its second time out.

By the time they got to the 2-yard line for first down because of a pass-interference penalty on the 49ers, the Seahawks had no time outs and only 16 seconds. That meant they couldn’t risk running the ball from the 2, getting stuffed, then having to waste a down and a chance at a touchdown with a clock-killing spike of the ball.

So they threw three consecutive times, fades to the back of the end zone. The Niners broke up two of them, and Smith missed Lockett on the third.

With 3 seconds left in the half, Macdonald decided to kick the short field goal to remain down two scores, 16-3, with the Niners receiving the second-half kickoff. That was the choice rather than try one more time for a touchdown plus a possible 2-point conversion that would have halved the lead.

The presumption by kicking was the Seahawks would hold the 49ers scoreless the remainder of the game — while getting down to that goal line at least two more times.

That absolutely did not happen.

The 49ers took that second-half kickoff and, without injured fill-in starter Jordan Mason running (in place of injured Christian McCaffrey), passed and ran 70 yards over nine plays to the Kittle touchdown catch and a 23-3 lead.

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