Seahawks: Offensive line market already thinning out

The best offensive tackles are already off the market, leaving the Seattle Seahawks to have to look elsewhere for help on the offensive line.

Free agency doesn’t officially start for another 24 hours, but the free agent market is already thinning out for offensive linemen. The Seattle Seahawks were expected to be aggressive in pursuing OL help, but they sat back and watched other teams grab the best players.

The first domino to fall was Ricky Wagner, who signed with the Lions. The former Raven was the best RT on the market this year.

Hours later the best LT on the market disappeared as well, or at least it appeared so. Andrew Whitworth was headed back to Cincinnati on a one-year deal, and then he wasn’t. Apparently the new deal isn’t done yet, but expectations are that it will be done soon.

Those two were the only top-tier offensive tackles on the market. After that the Seahawks will have to look at mediocre-to-average players like Russell Okung or Reily Reiff.

Perhaps that is why the Seahawks have been linked to guards more often than offensive tackles. Jason LaConfora reported that the Seahawks were interested in pursuing former Packer TJ Lang. Lang is expected to return to Green Bay, but nothing has happened yet.

I suspect that the Seahawks are intentionally slow-playing the Lang situation to see where the market ends up for the Pro Bowler. If the Packers don’t get Lang signed quickly, the Seahawks will be there to grab him on the rebound.

Next: Seahawks, please say no to Adrian Peterson

All this goes to show that the Seahawks aren’t going to be nearly as aggressive in fixing the offensive line as Pete Carroll said they’d be last week. They’re sitting back and letting the best players sign elsewhere while waiting for a “deal” to come along.

This is a plan that has worked well for the Seahawks everywhere except on the offensive line. Hopefully they’ll end up with better results this year than Bradley Sowell and J’Marcus Webb.