Seahawks down to just three draft picks? Carroll’s, Schneider’s plan is unique to 2021
It started last spring, with...Stephen Sullivan?
During a 2020 draft he conducted from his remodeled dining room while the coronavirus pandemic kept him out of Seahawks headquarters, general manager John Schneider traded away a sixth-round choice in 2021. That was to get back into the end of last year’s draft. He and coach Pete Carroll did that to select the unknown Sullivan. The tight end who played big wide receiver at LSU would have gone undrafted if Seattle hadn’t done that.
Sullivan was on the team’s practice squad most of last year. He appeared in one game for the Seahawks—at defensive end. He’’s now with Carolina.
Last summer the trend continued, for Jamal Adams. Schneider and Carroll traded Seattle’s first- and their third-round choices in the 2021 draft to the New York Jets. That was the cost of acquiring one of the best at his position, a 24-year-old All-Pro to be a cornerstone of a remade defense.
In October, the Seahawks traded their fourth choice in this year’s draft. That was to resuscitate the pass rush. Seattle traded a seventh-round pick in 2021, plus never-used offensive lineman B.J. Finney, to the Cincinnati Bengals to get two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Carlos Dunlap. Dunlap finished two wins with game-ending sacks in his first weeks as a Seahawk.
So by the time Schneider and Carroll traded their fifth-round pick in the 2021 draft—25% of their remaining draft stock for this year—to the Las Vegas Raiders on Wednesday for veteran guard Gabe Jackson to address quarterback Russell Wilson’s stated frustration, the Seahawks’ plans for this offseason had become obvious.
Rely more on proven veterans—and less than ever on this unprecedented draft—to fill holes on the roster.
For more than a decade, Schneider and Carroll have used the draft as the foundation of success. They’ve stockpiled late-round picks and undrafted rookie free agents in particular, chip-on-the-shoulder guys who have been ultra-motivated to exceed the rest of the NFL’s expectations for them. Richard Sherman. Kam Chancellor. Chris Carson. Doug Baldwin. Michael Bennett.
Doing that, Seattle has made the playoffs eight of the last nine years, playing in two Super Bowls and winning franchise’s only NFL championship.
In that time, Schneider and Carroll have averaged almost 10 picks per year. They’ve never had fewer than eight picks in any of their first 11 Seahawks drafts.
Until now.
After the trade for Jackson this week, the Seahawks have just three picks in next month’s draft.
They entered 2019 with four choices in the draft. Then Schneider made trade after replenishing trade, all in short order. He ended up with 11 picks that year.
What’s different this year?
Oh, only the most unusual, limited scouting draft—and American way of life—in NFL history.
No need to remind you how the pandemic has wiped out pretty much every norm in society. That includes the league’s annual scouting combine in Indianapolis. That was supposed to happen this month. It got canceled.
Instead, scouts are traveling to individual colleges’ pro days on campuses and watching workouts on live streams this month.
The medical evaluations team doctors usually get at the combine? Those got canceled, too. They got replaced by regional medical evaluations that are more shared-info co-ops than a chance for the team’s own docs to set their own opinions on prospects.
Because of COVID-19, many top players opted out of the touch-and-go college season in the fall and winter of 2020. The many prospects in the second-level Football Championship Subdivision are only now playing what would have been their 2020 seasons.
Yes, the already-wild crap shoot that is each draft has never been more of a guessing game than it is this spring.
Plus, as Schneider told NBC Sports’ Peter King last summer in explaining giving the Jets two first-round picks for Adams: “When you are picking in the late 20s (overall in round one every year because Seattle makes the playoffs), it’s a challenge.”
And that was Seattle’s case before the pandemic.
So Carroll, Schneider are for the first time with the Seahawks minimizing their risk by minimizing their opportunities in this particularly unpredictable, unprecedented draft. They have opted for surer, proven veterans such as Adams and Jackson over the most-unknown of draft choices in 2021.
So far, anyway. Seattle may eventually replenish some of their draft stock in the five weeks between now and the start of the draft.
But it’s not the team’s priority. It hasn’t been since the trade for the long-shot Sullivan 11 months ago, when it was becoming obvious the pandemic was going to impact football and all of society for years, not months.
Trading to gain draft picks is not the Seahawks’ primary concern right now, not with Seattle still in need of:
- a new starting center for Wilson
- a new pass rusher to replace free-agent Dunlap
- a new starting running back, with Chris Carson a free agent and Carlos Hyde signing this week with Jacksonville
- and more
The Seahawks are more likely to restructure contracts to find more 2021 cap space—they could do it with Wilson’s $19 million base salary without him needing to agreed to it—so they can buy more free agents such as former New England center David Andrews rather than trading to acquire picks.
The trade for Jackson—coupled with Wednesday’s agreement to sign tight end Gerald Everett from the Rams for one year and $6 million to join new play caller Shane Waldron’s Los Angeles-style, quicker passing game he already knows better than any Seahawk—are telling Wilson his team is listening to what he’s said he wants.
The way Schneider and Carroll are doing it is telling the rest of the league this is a different, only-in-2021 approach for the Seahawks to the draft.
This story was originally published March 18, 2021 at 12:42 PM.
