The Seattle Seahawks suffered their worst defeat (by margin of victory) since the 2017 season with their ugly 31-10 loss to the Buffalo Bills. Seattle looked lost on both sides of the ball, unable to remain even a little competitive until the game was already well out of hand late.

What happened? Well, this week's takeaways article is going to resemble more of an autopsy, because just about everything seemed to be a disaster. Without further ado, let's dive on in.

No. 1 - Seattle could not run the ball

The Seahawks do not have an identity if they cannot run the ball. This offense becomes entirely too one-dimensional when they aren't able to get things going on the ground. Unfortunately, this has become somewhat of a calling card for Ryan Grubb and this offense. Despite having a healthy Kenneth Walker III in the lineup and a weak Buffalo rush defense, Seattle couldn't attack the Bills. The Seahawks had all of one (1) yard rushing in the first half. They did exponentially increase that output in the second half, but that's not exactly a high bar, is it? Seattle ended the game with 32 yards on 17 carries as a team.

Of course, there is a primary culprit here, but we'll discuss them later.

No. 2 - Seahawks defense couldn't get off the field

Seattle had no answers for Josh Allen and the Bills offense. Buffalo had 445 yards of total offense, 29 first downs, and dominated the time of possession for 38:03 to 21:57. The Bills were also 8-of-15 on third downs, whereas the Seahawks were a miserable 1-of-7. Buffalo would not be denied for the overwhelming majority of the game. The only time Seattle's defense made life uncomfortable for the Bills was when Josh Jobe intercepted Allen and returned it to Buffalo's seven yard line. Unfortunately, Seattle could not do anything with it because...

No. 3 - Red zone woes punish the Hawks

...the Seahawks had some of the worst red zone offense you'll see on Sunday. Seattle had three trips to the red zone, and only managed to punch it in once. The worst was following the aforementioned Jobe interception. The Seahawks walked away from their field position with a grand total of zero points. They went for it on 4th-and-goal from the one and got stuffed. Earlier in the game, a bad snap from center Connor Williams turned a 2nd-and-goal from the three into 2nd-and-22, which Seattle had to settle for a field goal.

No. 4 - DK Metcalf was missed

I am not arguing the addition of DK Metcalf would have changed the outcome, or even made it more competitive. Seattle was so bad on Sunday one player, even as one as special as Metcalf, likely would not have mattered. But what was evident is the Seahawks offense was clearly lacking an explosive threat down field. Jaxon Smith-Njigba led the team with six receptions for 69 yards, but after him, it was rookie AJ Barner with the second most yards at 34. Seattle's passing attack simply is not as dynamic without No. 14 in the lineup.

No. 5 - This offensive line is bad and I'm running out of ways to describe how bad they are

The Seahawks' success this year is going to be hard-capped by how atrocious this offensive line is. Going into the season, we all expected this unit to be a weakness at worst, or a major question mark at best. Through eight games, they are worse than we could have feared. The fact this unit could not open up any rushing lanes whatsoever against the Bills is indicative of how bad this unit is. Seattle's offensive line cannot run block, but at least they make up for their shortcomings in the ground game by being total turnstiles in pass protection. Geno Smith may have been sacked only once, but he was under duress the entire game... again.

This article originally appeared on Seahawks Wire: 5 takeaways from Seahawks ugly 31-10 loss to Bills