Will Dissly is a quarterback’s best friend

Oct 4, 2022 - 8:08 PM

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Seattle Seahawks tight end Will Dissly has reacquainted himself with the end zone to start the 2022 season. His three touchdowns is tops among all Seahawks players and one short of matching his career-high set in 2019.

Lest we forget that in his two injury-shortened years, Russell Wilson to Will Dissly was a revelatory moment for this offense. Dissly caught 31 of 41 targets for 418 yards and 6 touchdowns in his first ten games, and you could tell that Wilson had a lot of trust and chemistry with Uncle Will.

We cannot lose sight of the fact that Dissly’s career could’ve effectively ended before it ever had a chance to get going. A double whammy of a ruptured patella tendon and a ruptured Achilles in consecutive years is about as damaging as it gets. The recovery time for Dissly more or less relegated him to backup status behind Greg Olsen, Jacob Hollister, and Gerald Everett over the ensuing two seasons. For all of his value blocking, his reduced involvement as a receiver made his three-year, $24 million contract extension a bit of a surprise.

Enter the Geno Smith era, and Dissly’s pass-catching ways have been reignited through the first month of the season.

Dissly has caught all 12 of his targets thrown his way for 116 yards and those aforementioned trio of touchdowns. This throw by Geno Smith in the Detroit game really highlights everything from anticipation and ball placement from the quarterback, to the route running and soft hands from the big man.

Seahawks quarterbacks throwing to Dissly are a combined 88/108, good for a ridiculous catch rate of 81.5%. Dissly’s depth of target has noticeably dipped since his injuries but he’s otherwise starting 2022 more closely to his 2018 and 2019 seasons. It also helps that unlike seasons past, the share of targets going to players other than DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett have shifted to tight ends.

So far, the Seahawks are committed to using Dissly, Colby Parkinson, and Noah Fant. If this continues, then Dissly is on pace for a career year. He’s almost always been reliable when called upon, and he’s looking like one of the biggest beneficiaries of this adjustment in the passing attack.