When Seahawks coach Pete Carroll got rid of former offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell in the offseason after the 2017 season, he did so because he wanted to get back to the kind of offense that had won him games during most of his career. Carroll hired Brian Schottenheimer to replace Bevell because Schottenheimer knew how to run the ball. Bevell had forgotten how.
Carroll knew that his Seattle team would be young on defense and have new parts among the offensive line. To save the defense from being on the field too much, just as they were in previous years, Schottenheimer would be brought in to run and run again and use Russell Wilson less than Bevell had.