League source confirms Seahawks will re-sign veteran Geno Smith to back up Russell Wilson
You didn’t really think the Seahawks were going to have an undrafted rookie as their lone backup to Russell Wilson again, did you?
Neither did they.
A league source told The News Tribune Thursday that Seattle is going to do the expected—and what coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider have been doing the last three seasons: re-sign former NFL starting quarterback Geno Smith to be their number-two quarterback for 2020.
The one-year contract could become official as early as Friday.
Smith, 29, is the former starter for the New York Jets. He also started for the Giants before the Seahawks signed him prior to the 2019 season. He beat out former Denver Broncos starter Paxton Lynch last preseason to become Wilson’s backup.
“He looks in control of the offense. He gets it,” Carroll said after the final preseason game of 2019, when Smith cemented the number-two job.
“He really understands it, so that’s a real positive.”
Smith got a lot of unusual attention for winning—and just merely calling Seahawks coin tosses last season. That includes this Yanny-or-Laurel controversy from the start of overtime in Seattle’s win at San Francisco in November.
Bringing back Smith should put to rest the idea the Seahawks would perhaps sign Cam Newton, the former NFL Most Valuable Player and Super Bowl starter Carolina released this spring.
Schneider did not squash that idea this month when he was asked on Seattle’s KJR-AM radio about possibly looking into Newton.
“Well, we’ll look at everything. We never say no to anything,” the GM said on KJR early this month. “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.”
Like former Packers starter Brett Hundley in 2018, Smith did not play a down in 2019. Wilson was the only quarterback in the league to play every snap again last season.
Smith said after winning the Seahawks’ backup job last preseason he firmly believes he is still worthy of an NFL starting job. The fact he didn’t agree to re-sign with Seattle for 2020 until now suggests he was shopping elsewhere. Problem for him is starting jobs have mostly dried up across the league.
Miami drafted Tua Tagovailoa with the fifth overall choice in last month’s 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.
Jacksonville is going to ride, at least for 2020, with Gardiner Minshew, the one-year wonder at Washington State two seasons ago.
Before Thursday’s agreement with Smith, Seattle had only Anthony Gordon, Minshew’s successor in 2019 at WSU, and Wilson as the quarterbacks on the 90-man offseason roster.
Gordon now becomes a candidate for Seattle’s 12-man practice squad, for grooming, in 2020.
The last time the Seahawks went with an undrafted rookie as their only backup quarterback was in 2016 with Trevone Boykin. And when Wilson had to miss some game time—though not actual games—with a sprained ankle then sprained knee early in the ‘16 season, the look of the Seahawks’ offense spooked the entire Pacific Northwest.
Including Carroll and Schneider. Since then, they have signed former Browns and Rams starter Austin Davis, then traded for Hundley plus signed and now re-signed Smith.
All for the what-if. Wilson still has yet to miss an in-season practice, let alone a game, in his eight seasons as Seattle’s starter.
The Seahawks exited this last month’s draft with 19 offensive linemen and one quarterback, Wilson. Then immediately after the draft they signed Gordon as a rookie free agent. He set a Pac-12 record with 48 touchdown passes in coach Mike Leach’s Air Raid offense at WSU in 2019.
Immediately after the draft in 2016, the Seahawks signed Boykin as an undrafted rookie out of TCU. By September, they made him their second and only other quarterback on the regular-season roster. Their thinking: Wilson has never missed a game. So Boykin can develop and learn from the Pro Bowl and Super Bowl passer for years without having to play.
Except he had to play.
In the first game of that 2016 season, Wilson got his right ankle stepped on and turned by 305 pounds of then-Miami defensive lineman Ndamukong Suh. Everyone in CenturyLink Field gasped when Boykin put his helmet on and took snaps with center Justin Britt on the sideline during Seattle’s ensuing defensive possession. Only because it was Wilson—credit “recovery water” or nanobubbles, or whatever—the starter did not miss a snap that day. He remained in the game and rallied his team to the win in that opener by throwing a touchdown pass to Doug Baldwin in the final minutes. Crisis averted.
Crisis returned two weeks later.
In the third quarter of a home win over San Francisco, Wilson’s left knee buckled under him. As it did, the 49ers’ Eli Harold grabbed the back of Wilson’s shoulder pads and yanked down the cornerstone of Seattle’s franchise from behind onto his left leg.
“My heart dropped,” Baldwin said that day.
Wilson eventually exited the game, put on a brace and watched Boykin run the offense. Boykin did throw his first and only touchdown pass of his career, a 16-yard strike to Baldwin against a bad Niners team that went 2-14 that season.
But in the final 21 minutes of that 19-point win, while Boykin had to play and Wilson got an MRI on the knee then watched from the sidelines, the offense compared to what it is with Wilson looked like the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers’. For those born after 1976, that’s not good.
That’s the Bucs team about which their coach John McKay famously said when asked about his offense’s execution, “I’m in favor of it.”
Since those unprecedented Wilson injuries four years ago, Carroll and Schneider have made it a priority to have an experienced backup to Wilson.
Boykin never played for another team. The Seahawks cut him in the spring of 2018 after his girlfriend alleged Boykin broke her jaw. This past February, he was sentenced to three years in prison in Texas for aggravated assault after he had been on probation there.
For 2017, the Seahawks signed Austin Davis, the former starter for the Browns and Rams.
For the 2018 season, the Seahawks traded a late-round draft choice to Green Bay for Brett Hundley, the former fill-in starter for the Packers when Aaron Rodgers was out injured for nine games in 2017. The Seahawks let Hundley go as a free agent after his contract ended following the ‘18 season. When he signed with Arizona last spring, Schneider got back as a compensatory draft choice the pick he gave to Green Bay to get Hundley. So that whole experience was a net wash in the name of insurance.
Bringing back Smith is in the same name.
This story was originally published May 14, 2020 at 1:59 PM.
