Seahawks 25 best players, #10 Tyler Lockett

The Seattle Seahawks roster is generally regarded as one of the best in the NFL top to bottom, but what about the talent level within the roster? Our co-editor Dan Viens takes a shot at ranking the team’s Top 25 players in order.

(PART 16 OF 25 IN A SERIES)

NFL Network does their Top 100 NFL players list every year, and this off season we’ve seen our share of analysts taking a crack at ranking the best rosters in the league. As we enter into the dog days of the off season, with the start of training camp still over a month away, I wanted to see what it would look like if I tried to rank the best 25 players the Seahawks have.

It was harder than I thought.

The top 10 was pretty easy. I would suspect most would end up with the same 10-12 names in some order or another. After that it gets dicey.

Among the challenges, how do you figure in the rookies and players who have never played a down in Seattle?

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My criteria was wide-ranging. Sometimes I went with pure talent, and other times I gave more weight to the players importance to the team. And in certain cases the players role…….played a role in my ranking. When in doubt, however, I would just ask myself “who’s the better player?”

So here we go……

The 10th Best Player On The Seahawks Roster is….

#10: Tyler Lockett, WR

We’ve heard this story before; uber-productive college player slips to the third round because he’s deemed to be too small, then grabs starting spot as a rookie and establishes himself as a future star.

Only this isn’t Russell Wilson we’re talking about, it’s a guy who caught 51 of his passes last year.

Tyler Lockett was seen mostly as a kick return specialist by many scouts, an elite one mind you, but one who would be limited to spot duty as a slot receiver because of his diminutive build and small hands.

Right.

While Lockett did everything he was expected to do on special teams, averaging 9.5 yards per punt return with a TD and 25.8 yards on kick returns with another score, it was his development in the passing game that has fans and the team so excited about the future.

Lockett turned those 51 catches into 664 yards and 6 TD’s of production as a rookie. It took him awhile to get into the flow of the offense, but once he caught fire he was tough to stop. 404 of his yards and 5 of his scores came after week 9.

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What makes him so dangerous despite his 5’10” 180 lb size, is his quick-twitch ability to change direction and his precise route running. Together with Doug Baldwin, he gives the Hawks a young, dynamic WR combo to build around for years to come.