A veteran behind Russell Wilson is now their norm. Are Seahawks interested in Cam Newton?
If you can’t beat them...join them?
Could that be Cam Newton and the Seahawks?
The 2015 NFL most valuable player has been a free agent for more than a month. Carolina released its former franchise player and Super Bowl quarterback after nine years in late March; a regime change didn’t want the 30-year-old as the Panthers’ guy anymore. Carolina signed Teddy Bridgewater to be their starter for 2020 and beyond instead.
The Seahawks have only undrafted rookie free agent Anthony Gordon behind franchise quarterback Russell Wilson. They signed Gordon last week.
They almost certainly not going to go with just Gordon behind Wilson at quarterback this coming season.
Is Seattle looking to sign Newton, who is 2-6 in his career against the Seahawks (including the playoffs)?
That’s what Dave Mahler, host on KJR-AM radio, asked general manager John Schneider on the air Thursday. Specifically, Mahler asked: Will the Seahawks would take a look at Newton?
“Well, we’ll look at everything. We never say no to anything,” Schneider said.
“You know, we go all the way to the wire with everybody, every deal that we’re in. So, we’ll poke our head around, with everything.”
Schneider and coach Pete Carroll pride themselves on being in on every potential deal for every player who becomes available. Even Antonio Brown. They tried to inquire last September about the troubled wide receiver, after the Raiders released him. But Brown signed with the Patriots faster than the Seahawks had a chance to find out how he interested he might be in them or them in him.
Newton and the Panthers unsuccessfully sought trade partners for him before his only NFL team released him. He had been scheduled to earn $18.6 million this year. Plus, he is coming off a season-ending foot injury after he played only two games in 2019. That’s why no one traded for him.
Now that he is a free agent, Newton can strike a deal with any team for a new cost for 2020.
He posted on his social-media account “I’m free and hungry.”
Problem for him is there aren’t really any starting jobs left in the league.
Miami drafted Tua Tagovailoa with the fifth overall choice in the draft. He is coming off a season-ending injury at the University of Alabama last fall, so his health could leave a temporary opening in the Dolphins’ quarterback job to begin the upcoming season, whenever it begins.
The Los Angeles Chargers drafted Justin Herbert from Oregon with the next pick after Tagovailoa. So he’s that team’s franchise guy now that Philip Rivers is gone to post-Andrew Luck Indianapolis.
New England has a gaping hole to fill after letting Tom Brady go to Tampa Bay. And the Patriots did not draft a quarterback; they only signed two rookie free agent passers. Right now, Jarrett Stidham and Brian Hoyer are the veteran QBs on their roster. Yet last week, NFL Network’s Michael Giardi reported “there is nothing cooking” between Newton and New England.
Jacksonville is going to ride, at least for 2020, with Gardiner Minshew, the one-year wonder at Washington State two seasons ago.
The Seahawks?
Wilson, 30, has not missed an in-season practice let alone a game in his eight seasons as Seattle’s starter. Carroll and Schneider saw in the 2016 season what happened when unprepared, rookie free agent Trevone Boykin was their only backup.
Since then, Carroll and Schneider have decided to keep an experienced QB as their backup, Wilson-insurance plan.
In 2017 they signed former Rams and Browns starter Austin Davis as the number-two quarterback. He took five out of 1,067 snaps that season.
In 2018 the Seahawks traded for Brett Hundley, Aaron Rodgers’ former fill-in starter in Green Bay.
Last season, former Jets and Giants starter Geno Smith was Wilson’s backup. Smith, like Hundley, never played a down. He is currently an unsigned free agent.
The Seahawks—and perhaps the Patriots—may be have plenty of time to decide on whether to add Newton.
For the same reasons three-time Pro Bowl pass rusher Jadeveon Clowney remains unsigned, as you may have heard.
The coronavirus pandemic has shut down team facilities. Those are going to remained closed indefinitely, until governors decide non-essential businesses can begin to re-open. The COVID-19 virus has also led the NFL to prohibit free agents from traveling to seek new contracts from teams. Newton and Clowney, who have recent and extensive injury histories, need to prove themselves medically worthy of new contracts to team doctors through in-person physical examinations. Those physicals with team doctors are not going to happen until travel restrictions ease and team facilities open.
Newton’s season-ending injury last year was a Lisfranc, bone and ligament damage in the mid foot. He had surgery for it in December. He missed more games last year for the Panthers than in his first eight seasons combined in Carolina and the NFL.
So Schneider will indeed look into Newton.
With a long lens.
This story was originally published May 4, 2020 at 6:59 AM.
