‘Amen’: Ernest Jones back, Seahawks almost completely healthy for test at Rams
Ernest Jones has indeed risen, from scary knee injury to full go for the biggest game yet this year.
“Amen,” the Seahawks’ middle linebacker and defensive signal-caller said with a wry grin Friday. “Amen.”
The centerpiece to coach Mike Macdonald’s defense is back full go after missing one game. Jones will start Sunday when the Seahawks (7-2) play his former Los Angeles Rams (7-2) in Inglewood, California, for first place in the NFC West (1:05 p.m., FOX television, channel 13 locally). “E.J. is ready if needed — which he is needed,” coach Mike Macdonald said following the team’s indoor practice Friday.
The defense’s architect smiled.
Rookie guard Grey Zabel and cornerback Josh Jobe, limited by injuries in practices earlier this week, were full go Friday and will start again at L.A.
Starting center Jalen Sundell and rookie wide receiver/punt returner Tory Horton are out. Sundell injured his knee last weekend in Seattle’s home win over Arizona. Horton injured his shin two games ago while catching two touchdown passes from quarterback Sam Darnold in the Seahawks’ blowout win at Washington Nov. 2.
No questionables. No doubtfuls. Seattle is relatively healthy for this showdown against the Rams — with the exception of Sundell and Horton.
Macdonald said the team is considering whether to put Sundell and/or Horton on injured reserve.
Olu Oluwatimi, the third-year veteran Sundell beat out to start this summer, will make his first start of the season Sunday at center.
With Horton out indefinitely, the team’s trade two weeks ago for wide receiver Rashid Shaheed from New Orleans to catch deep passes and return punts looks particularly prescient now.
Jones had a player fall on his right leg as he was running to make a tackle in the second quarter of Seattle’s 38-14 win at Washington Nov. 2. It looked bad. Macdonald talked after that game that it was possible Jones would miss multiple games with an injured knee.
The Super Bowl-winning middle linebacker for the Rams in the 2021 season said Friday he wasn’t scared it was a serious knee injury.
“Protected by the Man upstairs, so I knew I’d come out on top, regardless,” he said following his full-go practice Friday.
Fact is, if Jones was breathing this weekend his was playing against his old team.
“I grew up wanting to be a part of these games,” the former University of South Carolina Gamecock from Waycross, Georgia, said. “You want to be a part (of a game) where you can take control of a lot of things (for the season). The season’s not over, but it gives you a great help at the end.”
Ernest Jones’ Rams ties
Jones said he doesn’t talk a lot to L.A. coach Sean McVay and his former Rams.
There are no players on Jones’ 2021 defense he called signals for through Los Angeles’ Super Bowl win over Cincinnati that season remaining on the 2025 Rams. Quarterback Matthew Stafford and tight end Tyler Higbee are the only prominent teammates from Jones’ title-winning Rams four years ago still with Los Angeles.
The Rams traded Jones to Tennessee before the final season of his rookie contract, in the summer of 2024. A couple months later the Titans traded him to Seattle, where he has transformed Macdonald’s defense. The Seahawks re-signed him to a three-year, $33 million contract extension before this season.
Seattle is 13-4 in the last 12 months, since their bye week in the 2024 season, with Jones as their middle linebacker. He is a large reason the Seahawks are third in the NFL in rushing defense and first in rate of pressuring opposing quarterbacks.
Former Rams teammate Cooper Kupp, the MVP of that Super Bowl win for L.A., is now Jones’ teammate as a wide receiver for the Seahawks.
Jones acknowledges this game Sunday absolutely means more to him.
“Those are my guys, bro,” he said. “Like, we built something in that locker room, brotherhood, that I never take for granted.
“So those are my guys. But we’ve got a game to win, and we’ve got things ahead of us that we want to do.”
Potential move Saturday?
Macdonald mentioning injured reserve as a possibility for Sundell or Horton leads to the question of what the team will do with Christian Haynes.
The backup center and guard has a 21-day window returning from injured reserve to practice that ends Wednesday. The Seahawks by then must add him back to the active, 53-man roster, put him on IR for the rest of the season or potentially release him.
Haynes practiced this week, full go, coming back from his pectoral injury that’s had him on IR through the season’s first nine games.
Macdonald said earlier this week Sundell was likely to miss multiple games.
The obvious move for Saturday by 1 p.m. to affect the game-day roster for Sunday in L.A. would be Sundell to injured reserve and Haynes activated off IR to the 53-man roster to take his place. Haynes would then be the backup center to Oluwatimi against the Rams, as well as a backup guard.
With Haynes still on IR off the roster last week, rookie tackle Bryce Cabledue backed up Oluwatimi for the second half of Seattle’s home win over Arizona. Cabledue entered with Drew Lock midway through the fourth quarter of the rout, and messed up a snap exchange with the backup quarterback.
This story was originally published November 14, 2025 at 2:17 PM.
