49ers vs. Seahawks: A Decade of Fire and Blood
As the Seattle Seahawks enter this week on what seems like the brink of an implosion that could end the Carroll-Wilson marriage, it’s time to look back on a decade-old intense rivalry that has seen its fair share of drama, trash talk and gut-wrenching last-second pivotal plays.
2011: The Birth of a Rivalry (49ers 2-0 Seahawks)
Image: Ben Margot | Credit: AP
Over the past 10 years, the Seattle Seahawks have swept the San Francisco 49ers in five out of ten seasons and favors a mind-blowing winning record of 16-6.
Prior to 2011, there wasn’t any bad blood between the two NFC West foes. I specifically remember a good contingency of the 49ers fanbase openly cheering for the Seahawks in their Super Bowl loss to the Steelers in 2006.
Fast forward to five years later, the NFC West - coming off a season where all four teams in the division ended with a losing record – found itself host to two of the most polarizing college football coaches in Pete Carroll (USC) and Jim Harbaugh (Stanford).
The former Pac-10 rivals both brought their fiery personalities into the fold, but that’s about the only extent of their similarities in the world of football.
Both had opposing styles of coaching with Carroll, a San Francisco native, allowing a very loose culture centered around fun while Harbaugh, a former NFL quarterback, focused on running a tightly run ship of tough blue-collar football players.
In essence, the 49ers-Seahawks rivalry started because of how beloved each head coach was from their respective fanbase and because both came in with a past.
At the height of Pete Carroll’s dominating reign at USC, Jim Harbaugh took over a ragged football program at Stanford before turning it into a powerhouse that would upset USC several times on their way to the infamous “What’s your deal?” incident in 2009.
Going into Jim Harbaugh’s first season as the 49ers’ head coach in 2011, the stage was set, and it only got more intense from there on out.
Jim Harbaugh’s first victory in the NFL was against his archrival Pete Carroll’s Seahawks in Week 1 in a game that saw Ted Ginn return both a punt and kickoff for touchdowns on their way to a breezing 33-17 victory at Candlestick Park.
San Francisco would ultimately complete the sweep by defeating Seattle at home in a tight 19-17 game on their way to claiming the number-one seed in the NFC, ending their long playoff drought.
2012: The Wilson vs Kaepernick Show (49ers 1-1 Seahawks)
Image: Sports Illustrated
The 49ers entered the 2012 season as reigning NFC West champions and favorites to reclaim their throne while the Seahawks were seen as an up-and-coming team with an exciting and unconventional quarterback in Russell Wilson and a tough defense.
During their first encounter of the season, San Francisco prevailed in a tough 13-6 win at home on national TV in what would be Alex Smith’s last game versus the Seahawks in a 49ers uniform (3-0 against Pete Carroll’s Seahawks at that point).
After Smith suffered an injury mid-season, the 49ers made the switch to the more dynamic and bazooka-armed Colin Kaepernick who set the league on fire in his second pro year, his first as a starter.
Ironically, despite propelling the 49ers’ offense to new heights that scared the entire NFL, one team would prove to be Kaepernick’s kryptonite: the Seattle Seahawks.
Coming off an impressive win on the road in a nationally televised game against the Brady-Belichick-led Patriots, San Francisco suffered one of its most excruciating defeats under Jim Harbaugh, losing 42-13 in Seattle in prime time, in a game that showed both how reckoning Carroll’s defense had become and Harbaugh’s old college player Richard Sherman encouraging his new head coach to run up the score on Harbaugh’s 49th birthday.
San Francisco would go on to lose in the Super Bowl, but that season cemented both the 49ers and Seahawks as two powerhouses in the NFL with eerie resemblances; both had a top-five defense, a powerful running game, a dynamic athletic quarterback, and a prized head coach.
As a result, the rivalry brewed intense debates between both teams’ players, coaches, and fans alike. It would reach its culmination the following season.
2013: The Legion of Boom’s Reign of Terror (49ers 1-1 Seahawks)
Image: Elaine Thompson | Credit: AP
During the offseason, the Seahawks players took notice of how much buzz the 49ers were getting from around the league as being the heavy favorite to win the upcoming Super Bowl.
Colin Kaepernick made headlines being discussed as a future surefire MVP candidate.
Even Vernon Davis recognized the rise of the Seahawks as a serious threat in their quest for a championship.
If there is one thing we’ve learned by now, it’s that when the Seahawks are upset and seen as underdogs, they decide to unleash their fury on Jim Harbaugh and the 49ers.
One of the reasons behind this profound disdain of their opponent came from their outspoken team captain and arguably best player, Richard Sherman, and the never-ending chip on his shoulder against his old college coach.
Against the 49ers, Sherman prioritized finding every way possible to taunt and humiliate Harbaugh’s teams, making him insufferable to fans. And unfortunately for San Francisco, he would often come out on top.
The two foes would meet again early in the 2013 season that saw the Legion of Boom annihilate the 49ers’ offense in a resounding 29-3 win at home. In that game, the Seahawks rendered Kaepernick completely ineffective in the passing game with an abysmal stat line of 13-of-28 for 127 yards and 3 interceptions.
It became clear that if the 49ers were to prevail against the Seahawks’ vaunted defense, they would need to rely primarily on their ground game and stellar defense.
They did that in the second leg, letting future Hall-of-Famer Frank Gore carry most of the workload on their way to a difficult 19-17 victory against their archrival in a game that Richard Sherman had qualified as a “glorified practice.”
Both teams would go on to make the playoffs, but the Seahawks gained the upper hand in ensuring that the NFC’s road to the Super Bowl would go through Seattle, giving the 49ers the daunting task of having to beat them at home, something they had never done in the Carroll-Wilson era.
2013 Playoffs: The Sorry-Receiver Bowl (49ers 0-1 Seahawks)
Image: The Star-Ledger-USA TODAY Sports
Just like in the 1990s when it was inevitable that the 49ers and Cowboys meet in the playoffs on their way to the Super Bowl, the top two teams in the NFL did meet in the NFC Championship game before making the Super Bowl a mere formality.
San Francisco traveled to Seattle to take on the culminating peak of the rivalry between two opponents that didn’t hide their hatred for one-another.
Richard Sherman, Kam Chancellor, Earl Thomas, Bobby Wagner, Michael Bennett, Patrick Willis, Navorro Bowman, Justin Smith, Frank Gore, Anquan Boldin, Joe Staley, etc.: This group of mighty physical men battled in the cold in a game for the ages.
In what became one of the most physical playoff games ever, the 49ers put a valiant comeback attempt that was ultimately put to rest by none other than Sherman himself.
The loss wasn’t the only thing 49ers fans had to swallow. The Stanford alumni took center stage to put the 49ers on blast, highlighting his superiority over Michael Crabtree in a forever famous postgame rant on national TV.
Adding insult to injury was the fact that Bowman suffered a gruesome injury that would end up derailing his career. It happened while causing a potentially game-changing goal-line fumble that was never called and was received by fans throwing popcorn at him on the cart as he disappeared in the CenturyLink Field tunnel.
Much is made about the 49ers versus Cowboys rivalry in the 1990s, but none of those games reached the level of drama that this game did on January 19, 2014, a day that will forever live in infamy for the Faithful.
2014: The Changing of the guard (49ers 0-2 Seahawks)
Coming off their first Super Bowl win in franchise history, the Seahawks boasted all the confidence in the world in stomping down their rival, sweeping the season with two victories in games where the 49ers’ defense played well but couldn’t overcome the woes on offense.
San Francisco managed to score a total of just 10 points in the two games they played.
Not only would the 49ers miss the playoffs, but the entire franchise imploded, sending Harbaugh packing to Ann Arbor, seeing some of their cornerstone players retire early (Patrick Willis, Justin Smith), depart in free agency (Frank Gore) or flat out lose their mind (Aldon Smith).
The 2014 season would spell the doom to the Jim Harbaugh era, sending the Trent Baalke-led franchise back to the abyss of mediocrity for years to come. Maybe Sherman was a prophet?
Meanwhile, Seattle would continue its dominance, making another Super Bowl trip and seeing their quarterback outshine Kaepernick with every passing week.
2015 – 2017: The Dark Ages (49ers 0-8 Seahawks)
While the Carroll-Wilson empire would continue their winning ways, the 49ers experienced the dark ages, reminiscent of the pre-Harbaugh years with a coaching carousel, quarterback changes, draft misses galore and embarrassing performances on and off the field.
Source: FootballDB.com
San Francisco would end up getting swept four seasons in a row. The product put on the field was so bad, no game highlights are worth watching.
For 49ers fans, it felt like the Seahawks had completely taken over, rendered the rivalry completely meaningless and buried as their focus shifted to better quality opponents. The passion from the fans never wavered and the Faithful became subject to constant humiliation, hanging on the glory years and their five Super Bowl wins against Seattle’s one and only.
In vain, the pain endured for more than four long and dreadful years.
2018 - 2020: A New Hope
Image: Karl Mondon | Bay Area News Group
With a new regime and coming off a six-win streak under new quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, the 49ers started to hope again. Still trying to rebuild their team from scratch, John Lynch and Kyle Shanahan brought in a plethora of veteran players to help speed up the process, including former archnemesis Richard Sherman.
Sherman was instrumental in the rebuild of the 49ers and even after the Seahawks let him walk in free agency, continued to perform at a Hall-of-Fame level.
While the 2018 season’s dreams were cut short after Garoppolo suffered an injury that would sideline him for the entire year, the 49ers would manage their first victory against Seattle since 2013 in overtime fashion.
Sherman established himself as one of the leaders of the team and spoke about how important this win was during a losing season.
From enemy to fan-favorite, the former Seahawk won the heart of 49ers fans and never looked back. Out of all the players that played for both teams, “Uncle Sherm” is probably the only one who is still beloved by both Seahawks and 49ers fans to this day.
San Francisco would return to relevancy in 2019 with a dominant Super Bowl run. Despite falling short of their “Quest for Six” aspirations, the Sherman-led 49ers claimed the NFC West and top NFC seed back from their rivals in the last game of the regular season with their first road victory in Seattle since 2011.
In a rivalry constantly filled with drama, it took the very last play of the game for Dre Greenlaw to deliver a winning goal-line tackle for the ages.
Image Credit: Getty Images
Injuries have impaired the 49ers since, but it feels like the Kyle Shanahan era has helped tip the balance back in the 49ers’ favor and brought balance to the Force.
2021: The End of the Rivalry?
As the Seahawks prepare to enter a new phase after what will surely become their first losing season of the Russell Wilson era this year, it remains to be seen if the rivalry will continue to fuel the passion of both fanbases.
The fire of the 49ers-Seahawks rivalry shall always burn. However, seven years removed from the Harbaugh era (feel old already?), it feels like it has been on the low burner lately.
San Francisco enters this week’s game with the hopes to continue their playoff push and will face Seattle at its lowest point during the Pete Carroll era. This is the opportunity for the 49ers to lay the final blow to an enemy that has plagued them for more than a decade now.
The Faithful expects nothing less than a victory this Sunday. Will the team deliver?