Seahawks’ needy pass rush adds Benson Mayowa, plus Kerry Hyder from 49ers in 2-year deal
Their offensive line upgraded and their lead running back retained, the Seahawks have moved on to remaking their needy (again) pass rush.
With not one but two additions in their favorite, secondary phase of free agency.
Within an hour of agent David Canter saying client Benson Mayowa is bringing his six sacks from last year back to Seattle for 2021, the Seahawks signed free-agent pass rusher Kerry Hyder from their rival San Francisco 49ers.
Agent Erik Burkhardt confirmed Hyder, 29, is signing a three-year deal with Seattle worth $16.5 million, with a chance to earn another $1 million with incentive bonuses.
That third year reportedly is a voidable year for salary-cap purposes, per NBC Sports. That would make it a two-year deal worth $6.5 million, with bonuses that could push it to $7.5 million.
Voidable years are the Seahawks vogue trend right now. It allows the team to spread bonus-money accounting across an additional year beyond the practical length of the contract, salary-cap purposes.
Essentially, Hyder’s two-year, $6.5 million deal becomes a three-year, $6.5 million deal—with the third year including a phantom $10 million salary Hyder won’t see and Seattle won’t pay.
This is a new tack coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider are using in a most unusual offseason. The NFL salary cap has dropped from $198 million to $182.5 million per team after lost game-day revenues in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic. But the league last week signed new television and streaming-right deals that will net the NFL $10 billion per year for 10 years beginning in 2023.
That’s when each team is expecting to realize a spike in the cap, into the range of $220 million-plus per team.
So if there was ever a time for the Seahawks to depart from their norm and defer 2021 player costs into 2023 and beyond, it’s right now. They’ve done it to re-sign lead running back Chris Carson. They’ve done it to bring back center Ethan Pocic.
And now they are doing it to retain Mayowa and add Hyder to the pass rush.
Hyder had 8-1/2 sacks last year playing right defensive end for the 49ers. He had eight sacks in 2016 with Detroit.
With Mayowa re-signing and Carlos Dunlap, the two-time Pro Bowl defensive end who revitalized the Seahawks’ pass rush last season, still unsigned and available, Hyder can become the bookend, strong-side edge rusher for Seattle. That is opposite the “Leo” end Mayowa and Dunlap have played in Seattle coach Pete Carroll’s 4-3 defense.
The Seahawks released Dunlap this month to clear $14 million in space under the salary cap for the start of free agency. The team wants to bring him back, at their more cap-friendly price for 2021.
That possibility—a shorter-term, lower-cost deal—has increased as Dunlap has stayed unsigned into the secondary waves of the market.
The Seahawks have Darrell Taylor, their second-round draft choice from last year, also poised to debut at “Leo,” the weakside defensive end. But Taylor remains an unknown.
He had surgery in January 2020 in which doctors inserted a Titanium rod into Taylor’s lower leg to repair a stress fracture he played through in his final season at the University of Tennessee. He missed his entire rookie season recovering from that surgery and subsequent rehabilitation.
The dual deals for pass rushers add to what the Seahawks have done below the top, most-expensive tier of free agency in the last few days, per Carroll’s and general manager John Schneider’s usual approach to the market.
They’ve traded for Raiders starting guard Gabe Jackson, re-signed lead running back Chris Carson (two years, up to $14,625,000, with a voidable third year), signed free-agent tight end Gerald Everett (one year, $6 million), signed free-agent cornerback Ahkello Witherspoon (one year, $4 million), re-signed center Ethan Pocic (one year, $3 million, with a voidable second year).
Now they’ve brought back Mayowa and added Hyder—with Dunlap returning still a possibility.
When all of these deals become official in the coming days, the Seahawks will have to cut veterans or restructure existing contracts to fit the moves under the cap.
This story was originally published March 23, 2021 at 4:45 PM.
