Signs increasing Seahawks will keep Jadeveon Clowney--plus the alternatives if they don’t
The NFL is onto the secondary wave of free agency. The first, megabucks wave has passed—with the exception of one top guy who’s yet to sign.
The guy the Seahawks want, and need, most.
The third day for the NFL free-agent market in 2020 dawned with Clowney weighing his options between multiple teams and not liking what he’s seeing elsewhere. The New York Jets have reportedly been in pursuit of the three-time Pro Bowl edge rusher. The New York Giants have seemingly been hot, then cool, on him.
The Seahawks? They’ve been on him since they traded for him last summer.
There is a sense around the Seahawks their closeness with him, and his fondness for them, will ultimately win out. That what he could have in Seattle would be better than the market is indicating he could get somewhere else.
Mike Garafolo of NFL Network posted on Twitter Wednesday morning what’s become increasing apparent of Clowney: “He hasn’t found the market he expected. Could wind up the #Seahawks’ offer is the best he’ll get.”
We’ll see. Eventually.
Tom Brady on Tuesday declared he was leaving New England after 20 years with six Super Bowl titles quarterbacking the Patriots and heading to what reports say is a deal in waiting with Tampa Bay. That leaves Clowney as the long top free agent left on the market.
Not only that, he’s the top pass rusher left. That skill set is as valued as quarterbacking in the pass-and-sack-the-passer NFL.
The Seahawks have the passer, their $140 million franchise star Russell Wilson.
They need Clowney to have a semblance of an NFL pass rush.
Without him, Seattle has next to nothing at the most problematic area of the team, the one that largely kept the Seahawks from the Super Bowl last season. Only Miami had fewer sacks last season.
Tuesday, the Seahawks lost the second-most disruptive member of the defensive line, and the most consistent one with Clowney’s absences because of a sports hernia at the end of the season. Defensive end Quinton Jefferson agreed to a two-year contract with the Buffalo Bills.
That just added to the all-in nature of Seattle’s quest to keep Clowney. It will define their offseason, and perhaps their season.
A chance to match?
The Seahawks have driven many of their fans nuts (again) by staying out of the high-price, frenzied first days of free agency. Again, they let the megabucks stars—and even solid veterans such as offensive tackle Bryan Bulaga ($10 million per year to the Chargers)—sign elsewhere.
It’s what general manager John Schneider and coach Pete Carroll do every year. They wait for the second and third waves to sign cheaper, lesser-known players to cheaper deals.
Players such as B.J. Finney. The Seahawks signed him to a two-year deal worth $8 million on Tuesday. The 28-year-old former undrafted free agent has played four positions for the Pittsburgh Steelers, including two starts last season at center.
This year, the Seahawks’ free-agency plan begins and almost ends with Clowney. He’s that pivotal to their top offseason priority of boosting the pass rush.
So what’s taking so long?
It’s conceivable Clowney is giving the Seahawks a chance to make a final, counter offer. It would be a sign of respect and appreciation consistent with what Clowney’s had for Seattle since he arrived last year. And it’s what Schneider has been hoping for all along.
it is unusual in the NFL for a top free agent to go back to his most recent team and give it a chance to match a rich offer he gets on the market.
But with Clowney and the Seahawks, the goodwill has been working both ways since last summer.
Schneider and the Seahawks agreed in late August not to place a franchise tag on Clowney in 2020 to keep him from the market he is now entering. That was the key condition for the former first-overall pick in the NFL agreeing as Houston’s tagged player in 2019 to his trade to the Seahawks. Monday, the day teams could begin tagging players, Schneider and Seattle kept their word.
That, how he excelled while playing hurt for the Seahawks last season and how they came two games short of the Super Bowl are why he stated multiple times in the final weeks of last season he loves Seattle. He said it moments after the Seahawks’ playoff loss at Green Bay in mid-January. He’s stated publicly and to Schneider and Carroll that he loves the Seahawks’ locker room, Carroll’s environment—everything about his new team.
The market for Clowney appears to be at $21 million per year. That’s what Indianapolis gave pass-rushing defensive tackle Deforest Buckner Monday as the 49ers traded him to the Colts.
All other top pass rushers went off the market because of franchise tags from their 2019 teams: Yannick Ngakoue (Jacksonville), Shaquil Barrett (Tampa Bay), Chris Jones (Kansas City), Bud Dupree (Pittsburgh) and Matthew Judon (Baltimore).
Tuesday, Chicago agreed with Robert Quinn on a $70 million contract over five years. He had 11 1/2 sacks for Dallas last season. He turns 30 this offseason and thus is valued less around the league than Clowney. Vic Beasley, the 2016 NFL sacks leader, signed a one-year deal with Tennessee. That’s another mid-tier pass rusher Seattle may have been targeting as a Plan B if Clowney signs elsewhere,
All those moves increased Clowney’s value as the lone remaining top sack man left to sign.
What’s left if Clowney leaves
The Seahawks re-signed Jarran Reed for two years and $23 million on Monday. He had 10 1/2 sacks in 2018. He’s had five sacks total in his other three NFL seasons with Seattle. He missed six games last season because of an NFL suspension for alleged domestic assault.
Then it’s Rasheem Green, who emerged later last season with a team-leading four sacks in his second year, 2019 first-round pick L.J. Collier, who missed more than half his rookie season as a healthy inactive, Branden Jackson, who got a tender from the Seahawks as a restricted free agent Monday but has just 3 1/2 sacks in four years—and nada.
If Clowney decides to leave, the Seahawks have explored the possibility of trading for one of the franchise-tagged pass rushers currently off the market. That would be a reverse Frank Clark, the top sack man they traded to Kansas City last spring after tagging him. Seattle has checked into perhaps trading for Judon, according to Sports Illustrated’s Corbin Smith. That is after reports the team asked Jacksonville about Ngakoue.
Judon would come with a $16 million salary-cap charge, the guaranteed cost of his franchise tag. The Seahawks acquired a franchise-tagged player this last summer: Clowney. They traded with Houston to get him after the Texans had tagged in the spring of 2019.
The remaining accomplished free-agent pass rusher below Clowney is Dante Fowler. He spiked with 11 1/2 sacks last year as an outside linebacker in the Rams’ 3-4 defense. Seattle runs a 4-3. Fowler is younger than Clowney—he turns 26 in August. He had four sacks as a rookie for the Jaguars in 2016, eight for Jacksonville in 2017 and four for Los Angeles in 2018.
The Seahawks are counting on not having to weigh any of those alternatives. Their pass rush, their 2020 season, needs Clowney.
“We’re trying to get it done,” Carroll said last season. “He had a fantastic season.
“We’d love to have him back.”
This story was originally published March 18, 2020 at 6:42 AM.
