A thought occurred to me recently that I immediately dismissed but I thought I’d share with you anyway.
Are the Seahawks going to make one of ‘those’ trades?
The current roster is strong and deep in most areas. The offense looks practically loaded. Defensively, serious investment at linebacker and the secondary has created an intriguing looking collection of players.
Yet there’s no getting away from the fact that at the heart of the defense, there’s a lack of size, depth and arguably talent. There’s not even really much of a competition going on, unlike at several other spots on the roster.
That’s not to say they’ve been neglectful. They clearly haven’t. The signing of Dre’Mont Jones was a refreshing new approach to free agency. I think the Jarran Reed addition is worthy of praise too. Yet at the moment they’re banking on Jarran Reed to anchor the line and there’s a distinct lack of numbers and size waiting in the wings.
Thus, the fleeting thought on whether a big trade would be forthcoming.
I’m fascinated by how they’ll approach this. Will they stand pat, hope for the best and that some young players can mimic Abe Lucas a year ago and stand up to be crucial contributors in year one? Will they be aggressive to add? Will they be inactive and regret it if it ultimately costs the team when play begins?
In the past when there’s been a glaring weakness they’ve often been active buyers. The Sheldon Richardson, Duane Brown and Jadeveon Clowney trades are good examples. The most recent (and most expensive) deal was the move to acquire Jamal Adams.
On each occasion, a fix was sought to solve a problem. The Richardson trade was a direct response to Malik McDowell’s ATV crash. Brown was needed after an injury to the starter at left tackle. Clowney filled a Frank Clark-shaped hole.
In Adams’ case, we need to remember the off-season Seattle had in 2020. They failed to re-sign Clowney (a stated priority) and could only replace him with Benson Mayowa and Bruce Irvin. The quarterback (Russell Wilson, remember him?) had publicly called for the team to acquire ‘stars’. The defense was in serious danger of regressing and they made a very aggressive deal for a playmaker. Although Adams wasn’t a like-for-like replacement, in many ways he replaced Clowney as the ‘focal point’. Or at least that seemed to be the intention.
So what do they do in 2023? I’d argue talent and depth is required. However, I don’t think they’re going to make a significant trade this time for several reasons.
Firstly, they haven’t lost anyone. At least so far. If Dre’Mont Jones suddenly was ruled out for a long period of time this could change things. At the moment though they need to add and improve, not replace.
Secondly, I think this is a different Seahawks team these days. I think the flop of the Adams trade has left a mark. They’ve since gone about trying to acquire more draft stock, rather than trade it away, with a renewed focus on building through the draft. They’ve also had a lot of success in the last two drafts. Are they going to be more conservative in the trade market going forward? Possibly.
Thirdly, they have already invested in the defensive front with the Jones and Reed signings. How they go about creating depth is a question that probably won’t be answered with ‘big bold trade’.
I don’t imagine a blockbuster deal is forthcoming but I also don’t think we should ignore or limit how often we discuss what is clearly the weak point of the roster (especially on a blog that is ultimately designed to spend considerable time discussing roster construction).
Jones is very talented with a lot of potential to develop even further (thus, his price-tag) while Reed is a very capable trench performer with alpha qualities. It’s a little bit scary when you peak at the other players at Seattle’s disposal, though.
A pair of rookies and second-year Myles Adams fill the depth chart, alongside Mario Edwards Jr who’s on his seventh team in eight years. Bryan Mone is out indefinitely with no sign of a return any time soon.
I’m sure we’ll see plenty of different looks up front where they have two or three defensive tackles/five techniques on the field for early downs. At the moment though, whatever they roll with, they’ll be light up front.
Reed is listed at 306lbs by the Seahawks on their website. Jones is 281lbs and Mario Edwards Jr is 280lbs. That’s your starting D-line and it’s understating things to say it lacks size.
Depth is supplied by rookie Mike Morris (291lbs) and second-year Myles Adams (290lbs). Cameron Young (304lbs) is currently not practising with an injury.
I’m a little bit concerned looking at this group that Jarran Reed is going to be playing probably more snaps than he should. If he gets hurt, what do they do?
This is part of the problem when you feel like you need to completely revamp a unit. Adams and Mone are the only holdovers from last year. Everyone else is gone. When you then spend big money on Jones and reasonable money on Reed, you have limited money to play with.
Edwards Jr is here on a dirt-cheap deal and the Seahawks are seemingly banking on him playing beyond what he’s shown so far in his NFL career. They’re also relying a lot on Morris, Adams and eventually Young supplying adequate depth.
It feels paper thin with a huge emphasis on the two key off-season additions in free agency. Imagine if you lost either? Then you consider the run defense. Do they have enough good run defenders up front? Will their new additions learn quickly or is a slow start defensively inevitable for yet another year? Will they able to read plays, plug gaps and contain the edge better than last year, where they gave up 150-rushing yards a game? How will the investment at linebacker be impacted if the play up front is underwhelming? Are they too light on the D-line?
A few weeks ago I thought they might add to the depth by bringing back Shelby Harris and/or Al Woods yet neither happened. Now, in an attempt to fill the ‘Mone role’ while he remains unavailable, they’re continuing a game of ‘nose tackle musical chairs’. Every week a player is added to the roster and then a few days later, they’re off again. Some (Robert Cooper) have had a couple of goes as they search for a ‘good enough’ solution.
John Schneider has spoken about believing if you can play the nose in college you can do it in the NFL. It’s somewhat concerning, therefore, that they are basically looking for a passable warm body and can’t find someone suitable.
I also think this scheme more than any other is predicated on talent up front. We’ve seen a tentatively similar defense produce the #1 unit in the league with Aaron Donald blowing up the interior. We’ve also seen the same person who coached that defense move to the Chargers, inherit and acquire elite talent off the edge and struggle because he hasn’t got a serious interior threat.
Maybe Jones and Reed can be a ‘Coke Zero’ version of Donald and Greg Gaines in LA? I really hope so, although I’d feel a lot better if the actual Gaines had been signed to play next to them. Either that or they’d found someone to properly anchor the middle of the defense, to allow the key pair to disrupt. The entire D-line would feel so much stronger with a proper nose tackle, freeing Jones to play inside/out and Reed to essentially do a bit of everything.
I’m trying not to think about the Seahawks not having the #10 pick in 2022 because of the Adams trade — a selection that would’ve placed them to potentially draft man-mountain Jordan Davis.
It’s at a time like this that someone often flops into the comments section to accuse me of obsessing over Adams. I just think it’s impossible not to spend a lot of time reflecting on how damaging that trade was or to now question why he is still set to earn a team-high $18.1m this year despite an unclear timeline on his return.
As we’ve said a few times — it would’ve been perfectly reasonable to approach him about a pay-cut. Had he been cut, or if he was to be cut today, there’s no way he’d get close to $18.1m on the open market. Given the nature of his injury, a fair prediction is he’d either receive a lukewarm market or teams would wait until he was close to a full recovery before considering signing him.
Instead the Seahawks are paying an elite salary for a complete unknown. For all we know, he’ll start the year on the PUP list and miss at least six weeks. A conversation about a pay cut or at least converting some of his salary into incentives would be totally understandable. Frankly, if he rejected the idea, he probably should’ve been sent packing by now.
Either way, some of his money (on top of the $11m in cap space they currently have) could’ve gone towards a more experienced, deeper D-line and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
I fear it’s too late to do anything about it now. If there were any nose tackles out there, they’d probably already be in Seattle. There’s no Snacks Harrison waiting at the diner. The Seahawks haven’t ever really shown much interest in bringing Ndamukong Suh back to the PNW. Linval Joseph, approaching his 35th birthday, has the same age/endurance issues that presumably led to Al Woods’ departure.
One of the necessary features for a team in the modern NFL is a strong D-line. It feels like most contenders, even the ones who bank on the genius of Patrick Mahomes, have an elite level D-liner capable of wrecking games — or tremendous depth. For the Chiefs it’s Chris Jones. The Eagles have bodies galore, as do the 49ers. The Bills spent big on their defensive front. The Cowboys and Jets — among the top defensive units last year — also have strong talent and/or depth within their D-lines.
If the Seahawks are going to truly take the next step as a team, it’s not a stretch to believe they need more up front.
Thus, I think they’re another off-season away from being a legit Championship contender — even in a wide-open NFC. If they’re playing the long-game, that’s fine. I would understand and embrace that. Perhaps they believe they can lean on a D-line heavy draft next year and wait this out?
The thing is, they do feel quite close to having an ideally rounded roster (at least on paper) today, when the NFC looks particularly unthreatening (at least compared to the AFC). This is the one big question mark. D-line. That makes you want cake today, rather than in 2024.
Also, we don’t know what challenges next year will bring. It’ll be harder to focus on the D-line if Geno Smith doesn’t take his opportunity this year to justify a contract that’ll be worth between $31-40m next year. If he needs to be replaced, that will likely take precedence. I hope it doesn’t come to that but we don’t need to pretend it’s out of the question.
They also don’t have much cap space available next year and all signs point towards a draft focus rather than a free agency focus in 2024. Therefore, the later they pick the harder it’ll be to find D-line solutions (and while many are hailing the DT depth next year, the usual caveat of it being far too early to judge definitely applies here — I’ve started dipping into the group and would urge some caution).
If they did want to try and fix this now, who could they target?
There are no clear nose tackles so it’d have to be a different type of interior defender.
The two players that you could at least bring up in a conversation are Kansas City’s Jones and Miami’s Christian Wilkins. Both would cost an absolute fortune, firstly in picks and then in salary, making any potential deal appear fanciful at best.
The Chiefs would be mad to part with Jones, especially with $47m in effective cap space ready to play with next year. It’s unclear why they haven’t just paid him.
Jones has just turned 29 so it makes more sense for the Chiefs to keep/reward him than it would be for another team to trade a kings ransom for him and then pay him a record-breaking deal. A trade feels virtually impossible. What would it take? The starting price would have to be two firsts, you’d think. How many elite years would you get out of him though?
I’d say it’s a non-starter.
Wilkins is a slightly more realistic option. He is currently ‘holding-in’ for the Dolphins. Despite the fact he’s still on his rookie contract, he actually turns 28 in December so he’s not as young as you might think.
He’s a very good defensive tackle, he’s extremely athletic and he’s a great character. The problem is — and this is probably why Miami is finding it hard to reach common-ground on a contract — his general performance is better than his production.
In terms of consistency he’s excellent. He had an 85.1 PFF grade a year ago (ninth among DT’s) and he had plus marks as a pass rusher and run defender. In 2021, he recorded an 83.3 grade.
However, he’s never had more than 4.5 sacks in a season. It’s just not a huge part of his game. In comparison, Jones has two 15.5 sack seasons in his career and 63 sacks in six seasons as an established starter.
Wilkins is very good. Jones is a game-wrecker.
Trying to work out Jones’ salary worth is easy. You make him the highest paid DT in the game. Working out Wilkins’ value is far trickier.
The Dolphins would likely ask for premium trade compensation because it’d create a hole in the heart of their defense and the entire league is crying out for good, quality DT play. That would make it hard to work out exactly what is fair value for a player who might never get more than five sacks a year.
I can’t think of any other obvious trade candidates to discuss. Vita Vea’s contract restructure means that’s a no-go as it’d be far too expensive for the Buccs to deal him. Quinnen Williams and Jeffery Simmons both just got paid. Ditto Daron Payne and Dexter Lawrence. Even in the second and third tier talent-lists it’s not clear who you could move for apart from someone like Johnathan Hankins, given Dallas spent a high pick on Mazi Smith.
I suspect the Seahawks will end up bringing someone in who is cut by another team and perhaps the game of ‘nose tackle musical chairs’ will simply continue until someone sticks?
I hope the likes of Mike Morris and Cameron Young can settle in quickly, stay healthy and provide good rotational options. Young in particular feels like a more integral player than he probably should be as a rookie. They need him to get back on the field, take a chunk of reps and excel in the way the likes of Abe Lucas did as a rookie, albeit in a rotational role rather than a full-time starter. I think he’s got the skills to do it but that’s a lot of pressure on young shoulders.
There are a lot of exciting aspects of Seattle’s roster. I think we can all agree that, should everyone stay healthy, the offense looks about as exciting as I can remember since I started following the Seahawks. Never before have they had this many explosive, dynamic weapons.
There are positives about the defense too. Yet if they get pushed around up front and if they simply can’t plug gaps, defend the run properly and contain off the edge — a lot of good work on the roster elsewhere will be undone.
That’s a frustrating thought made all the more frustrating by a lack of an obvious fix. When we need a Snacks Harrison-level option to cling to, there’s not even a crumbs Harrison out there.
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