The Seahawks were back to work Monday following a loss in Baltimore that coach Pete Carroll referred to as, "a very difficult game" in which they "struggled throughout." In addition to some injury updates, here are four takeaways from Monday's press conference:

1. Carroll wants the Seahawks to make life a little easier on Geno Smith to help him cut down on turnovers.

As he has following previous losses, quarterback Geno Smith was quick to shoulder the blame, even if there was plenty to go around, and Carroll noted, “I don’t think this is about Geno at all. I think this is about our football team not answering the bell here. We couldn't get it done."

A day later having reviewed the film, Carroll stuck to his assessment that the struggles fall on everyone, not just Smith.

"We struggled across the board on offense, everybody had some difficulties in this game, it just added up to where the quarterback is in the middle of that as well," Carroll said. "We have to do a lot better, we have to protect better, we had some communication things we can clean up and all of that. But I think that Geno's consistent accountability, I think it's really a strength of his, and it helps the guys around him. But we've got to help him, we've got to make sure we're doing our part."

Yet even if the offensive struggles have to do with a lot more than Smith's play, the fact remains that he has been a part of several turnovers in recent games, throwing six interceptions and losing two fumbles on sacks in the last four games after committing just one turnover in the first four.

"We're so conscious of taking care of the football, it's such a big deal to our program, it has been for years," Carroll said. "It's just always paid us back that we're so conscious of it, so when one or two keep popping up, we need to throw those goose eggs where we go out in games and we don't give any. So, yeah, I'm just concerned."

When it comes to his quarterback, Carroll said he needs to help make sure Smith isn't pressing when things aren't going well for the offense.

"One of the things that I want to help Geno with as much as I can is no overtrying, pressing to make a play where he feels like he's got to go above and beyond and find a throw that may not be there and work too hard at it," Carroll said. "He's a great competitor, and he believes in himself, so there's times, as with all great quarterbacks, they think they can get it in there, so they'll take their shot at it. But I would like to make the point to anybody that's watching our program, we're doing everything we can to not give them the football. Any time we're turning the ball over, it hurts. That does not play into the way we feel like when we're at our best.

2. Jaxon Smith-Njigba continues to progress.

If there was a silver lining in Sunday's loss, aside from Boye Mafe extending his sack streak to six games, it might be the play of rookie receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba, who had a career-best six catches for 63 yards.

After a slow start to the season, caused in part by a fractured wrist in the preseason, Smith-Njigba has become a big part of the offense over the last month. In his last four games, the first-round pick out of Ohio State has 210 yards and two touchdowns on 17 receptions, a big leap from his first four games in which he totaled 62 yards on 12 catches.

"He's really turning into one of the regulars, you can just feel him," Carroll said. "He's making good choices, good decisions, unfortunately it's just one play, but the ball that he bobbled early on the third down conversion would have been a really nice one to grab. But you can see we're using him, we're going to him, and we really trust him, he's going to be a big factor and he's doing well and remember to remind you he had a broken wrist to start the season. He's in great shape with that now and that makes a difference."

3. Leonard Williams had a solid debut.

Leonard Williams, who was acquired in a trade with the Giants last week, made his Seahawks debut Sunday, recording a pair of tackles while playing 54 percent of the team's defensive snaps. It wasn't a flashy debut for the defensive end, but Carroll liked what he saw from Williams in his debut.

"I thought Leonard did a nice job with all the stuff he had to pick up in such short notice and all that," Carroll said. "He played really tough and really good technique like he does and gave us a good healthy dose of plays out there.

"He played good solid technique the whole day. Played the line of scrimmage really well, got in the backfield a couple of times. He did a nice job."

4. Assessing a tough day for the run defense.

The Seahawks had been really good against the run all season leading into the game, holding opponents to just 3.6 yards per carry, with no opposing running back recording a run of 20 or more yards through seven games (then-Cardinals quarterback Josh Dobbs did have a 25-yard scramble).

That changed in a big way on Sunday, however, the Ravens rushing for 298 yards, including runs of 60, 42 and 40 yards by running backs Keaton Mitchell and Gus Edwards.

"We just faced the two top running teams in the NFL; these guys know what they're doing," Carroll said of Cleveland and Baltimore. "We didn't expect to shut them down, we were hoping to control it a whole lot better than we did. I think it's really running those in to two teams back-to-back that makes it look like there's a question there."

The Ravens rushing attack is unique, of course, because of the presence of Lamar Jackson, one of the best running quarterbacks in league history.

"The biggest difficulty is the speed of the quarterback," Carroll said. "Lamar can run like crazy. He gets on the edge and then it looks like you have a shot to get him, it's your responsibility, and he makes eight yards on the play. That's a difficult part of it. We saw the plays we worked on, there were a couple of little wrinkles that they put in, but basically the way they run their offense they have a wide variety of runs and concepts and formations that they run their stuff from. It's a challenge when you play these guys, them balanced and the things that they did in the game. That's how they do it. It's not a surprise, it's a big package of running game that you have to deal with."

Jackson and the Ravens' run schemes stressed the Seahawks enough as it was, then the issues were compounded in the second half by too many missed tackles, leading to the aforementioned big runs.

"We've already addressed that, in terms of the discipline of the fits in the running game. It's how you adjust to their motions and things like that; we can do that better," Carroll said. "We've been doing it really well and for some reason in this game, we were behind it some and some plays got out. We didn't handle the quarterback as well as we wanted to. We went into it with the real thought of keeping him out of the big play category, but he took off on a couple of them and made a bunch of yards, so that was part of it. As the game wore on, we got sloppy with our tackling, and we tackled poorly later on in the game. Kind of taking some shots instead of being really disciplined about the technique of it. It's the combination of things that we dealt with today."

Jackson and the Ravens' run schemes stressed the Seahawks enough as it was, then the issues were compounded in the second half by too many missed tackles, leading to the aforementioned big runs.

"We've already addressed that, in terms of the discipline of the fits in the running game. It's how you adjust to their motions and things like that; we can do that better," Carroll said. "We've been doing it really well and for some reason in this game, we were behind it some and some plays got out. We didn't handle the quarterback as well as we wanted to. We went into it with the real thought of keeping him out of the big play category, but he took off on a couple of them and made a bunch of yards, so that was part of it. As the game wore on, we got sloppy with our tackling, and we tackled poorly later on in the game. Kind of taking some shots instead of being really disciplined about the technique of it. It's the combination of things that we dealt with today."