Pregame from Arizona: Could this be Bobby Wagner’s final Seahawks game? Jarran Reed out
What the Seahawks needed wasn’t all on the field they were playing in.
Seattle was kicking off Sunday at State Farm Stadium in Arizona at the same time the Chicago Bears were starting against the Packers in Green Bay. The Seahawks’ (8-8) hope for making the playoffs for the 10th time in 12 years relied on beating the Cardinals while getting an upset by the Bears at Green Bay.
Seattle’s task at Arizona could be the last games as Seahawks for Jordyn Brooks and...captain Bobby Wagner.
Both the inside linebackers’ contracts end with the end of the 2023 season. Both addressed the possibility of Sunday being their last Seahawks games this past week.
Wagner turns 34 during next season. Wednesday he was selected to the Pro Bowl team for the ninth time (tying Russell Wilson’s and Hall of Famer Walter Jones’ franchise record).
Wagner said this past week he “100%” is playing next season, for someone. The six-time All-Pro who’s earned $5.5 million for this season said his thinking about whether he will play next season for Seattle is to “let the cards fall where they may.”
Asked if he and the team want Wagner to play for the Seahawks next season, coach Pete Carroll said Wednesday: “I would hope. Yes. We would love to have him.”
Brooks’ rookie contract as Seattle’s first-round draft choice in 2020 is also ending.
He wasn’t going to sit for a second consecutive game because of an ankle injury that also limited him some in practices this past week.
“It’s important (that I play). For a number of reasons,” Brooks said before he started next to Wagner again in the middle of Seattle’s defense Sunday.
“Not knowing the future here, this might be my last time suiting up with these guys.”
He knew a sixth loss in eight games to end the season for the Seahawks, or a Packers win over the Bears, and Brooks’ rookie contract would be over.
Jarran Reed inactive
The Seahawks had hoped Jarran Reed’s bruised knee would loosen in time for him to play Sunday. It did not.
The 30-year-old defensive tackle was inactive for the game the Cardinals were likely to run at the inside of Seattle’s recently porous run defense.
Fellow defensive lineman Mario Edwards was also inactive. He injured his knee the previous weekend in Seattle’s home loss to Pittsburgh.
The Steelers ran 46 times for 202 yards on New Year’s Eve with Brooks missing from the defense, and Reed and Edwards hurting.
In anticipation of Reed and Edward being out at Arizona, the Seahawks promoted from the practice squad nose tackles Austin Faoliu and Matt Gotel for Sunday’s game.
Gotel is a Tacoma native from Lakes High School. The Seahawks have had him on and off their practice squad the last two seasons.
If he played Sunday it was going to be his first snaps in an NFL regular-season game.
That would be the culmination of Gotel’s long, untraveled road to the big time.
Gotel went from Lakes to Snow Junior College in Emphraim, Utah, then to play for Division-II West Florida. In 2022 he paid his own way to fly back from the East Coast to get his first free-agent tryout and first attract the Seahawks.
Other Seahawks inactives
The Seahawks also left inactive for Sunday’s game: rookie running back Kenny McIntosh (thumb), linebacker Patrick O’Connell, 41-year-old offensive lineman Jason Peters (toe), starting right tackle Abraham Lucas (knee) and offensive lineman Raiqwon O’Neal.
McIntosh, the team’s seventh-round pick from Georgia, went the entire regular season without playing a snap on offense. He played 13 snaps in three games on special teams. He spent the first months of this season on injured reserve following a knee injury he got in the team’s annual mock-game scrimmage in early August.
This story was originally published January 7, 2024 at 12:44 PM.
