The Seahawks only need their rookie wide receiver Jake Bobo to do one thing.

When other teams scouted Bobo at UCLA last season, they saw all the things he couldn’t do. At only 205 pounds on his lanky frame, he didn’t possess enough strength to break NFL tackles and turn short catches into big plays. Graduating at 24 years old, he didn’t entice front offices with the promise of youth. And when he ran a disastrously slow 4.99-second 40-yard dash, most said he was too slow for the pro game.

But the Seahawks saw a perfect fit. And they were right. So far, Bobo has a pair of touchdown catches in his first six NFL games, including a ridiculous snag in the end zone last week against the Cardinals.

Entering the 2023 draft with a second-chance star in Geno Smith, a (finally) rebuilt offensive line, a great young running back in Kenneth Walker III, and a strong receiving group headlined by DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett, the Seahawks had the core of a strong offense.

But the front office—and many Seahawks fans—could tell you that this past season, when they approached the end zone they lacked a true touchdown weapon. The numbers agreed: the team ranked 28^th in the league in red zone scoring efficiency.

And your eyes weren’t deceiving you if you thought their top target Metcalf struggled to turn red zone targets into touchdowns in 2022. In fact, Metcalf was one of the worst in the league last year, converting 22 targets into only nine completions and six touchdowns. For all his strength, and all his speed, he just isn’t that guy. And neither is Lockett or the oft-injured Dee Eskridge.

So in the lead-up to the draft, the Seahawks looked to solve this problem. They locked up a classic high-upside explosive receiver in Jaxon Smith-Njigba (“JSN”) in the first round, but also kept an eye on Bobo, hoping he would go undrafted. When he did, they swooped in and outbid other teams.

Why the interest in a player so few thought had the juice?

At 6’4,” no receivers taken in this year’s draft are taller than him, and his 78” wingspan and 36” vertical leap are respectable as well. None of the numbers are elite on their own but the total composition of Jake Bobo is a strong red zone target.

For the Seahawks, this is what matters. They only need him to get early separation, something he excels at, and use his height and long arms to create a window for Smith, who despite some uneven play this season has wowed with the guts to attempt nearly impossible throws in big moments.

Let Bobo’s highlight reel catch last week be the blueprint. It was rated the most improbable touchdown of the year, with a likelihood of just 15.9 percent. Few other quarterbacks would attempt it, much less an unproven rookie. But with Bobo lined up against Arizona Cardinals’ 5’10” cornerback Starling Thomas, Smith saw the advantage and knew Bobo could create enough separation with a double move and find a way to secure the catch.

We should see more of this moving forward. Although Metcalf and Lockett have been slowed by injuries the past couple weeks, and Eskridge appears questionable to return this week, when they’re back at full strength the vision for the offensive attack looks clear: the Seahawks can lean on Walker and the other receivers to get them close, then use Bobo to get them on the board. With such a clear fit, Bobo has already found a place in the offense that previous training camp darlings like Kasen Williams and John Ursua couldn’t.

This past draft, coupled with the free agency pickup of Bobo, also makes Pete Carroll, John Schneider, and the rest of the Seahawks front office look better than they have in years. After years of frustrating drafts with head-scratching early picks (LJ Collier, anybody? Malik McDowell?) and endless trading back to accumulate late-round picks, this year’s rookies headlined by cornerback Devon Witherspoon, Bobo, and JSN are already contributing in a major way.

We’ve seen this before.

With their depth, variety of skills, and blend of veteran presence alongside exciting young players, this year's roster is starting to look like Seattle's Super Bowl teams of the last decade. In that era, the Seahawks utilized role-players who fit exactly where they were needed. They embraced what players could do, rather than forcing what they couldn’t, to create a dynamic squad that could beat you a million different ways.

These Seahawks can do the same thing. And with a weak schedule the rest of the way, they look poised to make a run. Jake Bobo’s arrived just in time.