Odell Beckham to the Seahawks is a pipe dream. A really bad pipe dream.
Beckham would be Jimmy Graham 2.0 in Seattle
Beckham wouldn’t match his past numbers with the Seahawks anyway. Take a look at those stats again. Over his last three full seasons, Odell Beckham Jr. averaged 10.6 targets per game. Doug Baldwin averaged 7.2 in his last three seasons. Does anyone seriously think that Pete Carroll would throw the ball to OBJ that much? Remember, this is the team that brought in Brian Schottenheimer to fix the running game. It’s the same team that added D.J. Fluker to clear the road for those runs. And why would you throw more often to the guy who won’t catch as many balls?
Remember, Jimmy Graham came to the Seahawks averaging 8.7 targets per game. In Seattle he averaged 6.2 targets. He was a superstar receiver that saw his production drop in his new home. Should the Seahawks have traded for Graham, knowing they weren’t going to give him that many targets? That’s a question best answered another time. The point is, Odell Beckham Jr. would see a similar drop in targets, and a similar drop in production.
Now you could argue that Beckham would pick up the difference between Graham’s targets and new tight end Ed Dickson. We’ll generously assign Dickson 50 targets for 2018. That still leaves 50 targets which went to the tight end. Those could go to Beckham.
OBJ wouldn’t see the same targets on the Seahawks
One problem there. The Seahawks threw the ball 550 times last year, and want to throw it even less. Wilson threw just 407 passes the year Seattle won the Super Bowl, and 452 the next year when they again won the conference.
Pete Carroll wants to return to the style that won the title. He definitely wants to keep the pass attempts under 500. And there go the 50 extra targets. Keep in mind the Giants throw the ball at least 600 times per season. That’s how you can throw to one player 160 times. The Seahawks weren’t built that way last season, and certainly won’t be in 2018. Those are targets Beckham wouldn’t see in Seattle. If OBJ does somehow miraculously wind up with the Seahawks, you can expect the same dropoff we saw with Jimmy Graham. Would he still be a great addition? Of course he would. But it isn’t happening, and here’s why.