Over the last decade or so, the Seahawks have acquired a few big names at skill positions. For one reason or another, it’s been a disaster every time.
The Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll and general manager John Schneider have hit more than they’ve missed when it comes to personnel. Their success has predominantly been internal, whereas acquiring offensive players through free agency or trade has been a different story.
While you may be thinking, “But Ty, they hit the jackpot by signing Michael Bennett and Cliff Avril in 2013.” That’s true, but they’re defensive players, and today we’re talking about running backs, wide receivers, and tight ends, silly.
Yes, the Seahawks hit on Bennett and Avril in 2013. But that same year, John Schneider sent the Minnesota Vikings their first-round pick (which became Pro Bowl cornerback Xavier Rhodes) for a guy named Percy Harvin.
While Harvin played a key role in the Seahawks’ Super Bowl XLVIII victory, well… you know how the rest of his career in Seattle panned out.
The Deion Branch problem
Harvin wouldn’t be the first or the last skill player to implode for the Seahawks. No, this trend began to rear its ugly head roughly 12 years ago, when the Seahawks traded for former Super Bowl MVP Deion Branch.
Branch was coming off of a near-1,000 yard season in 2005 and was looking to be properly compensated. This led to an inevitable holdout which, as we’d all expect, Bill Belichick was unwilling to oblige by.
The Seahawks acquired Branch for a first round pick (sound familiar, right?) and signed him to an egregious six-year, $39 million deal.
At his best, Branch was a mediocre second or third option in the Seahawks’ passing game. Injuries plagued him from 2007 onward and he was eventually traded back to the Patriots by John Schneider in 2010.
The Julius Jones problem
Two years after acquiring Branch, the Tim Ruskell regime looked to free agency to add another big name to the fold: Julius Jones. After Shaun Alexander’s sudden exit, the Seahawks needed a new workhorse at tailback and saw Jones as a worthy heir.
Jones posted back-to-back 1,200 yard seasons for the Cowboys in 2005 and 2006 before faltering in his contract year of 2007. The Seahawks felt certain he would bounce back in a major way, but they were sorely mistaken.
Through his two years of work in Seattle, Jones failed to break 700 yards in either year. He often appeared slow and was a non-factor in most games. At times, he was simply outshined by his platoon partner Mo Morris.
Jones was cut in 2010 after the Seahawks traded for Marshawn Lynch and that worked out pretty well.
The T.J. Houshman-something problem
Despite both Jones and Branch being clear disappointments during this time, Ruskell and co. didn’t get the memo. In Ruskell’s final year as the Seahawks’ general manager, he threw a five-year, $40 million contract to the man, the meme, the legend T.J. Houshma-zilly. I mean, T.J. Houshma-zod. Uh… T.J. Whosyamomma?
Sorry, I’ll get this.
Right, T.J. Houshmandzadeh. That one. Once again, it didn’t work out.
The Seahawks were in a state of flux when Houshmandzadeh arrived. Mike Holmgren had just retired and Jim Mora, Jr. was taking over. The team had some talent, but were coming off a 4-12 season filled with injuries.
Houshmandzadeh wasn’t an awful player for the Seahawks, but his 2009 season was unimpressive considering the money he was making. After the major organizational shakeup, Houshmandzadeh did survive into the PCJS era… temporarily.
Just a month into the 2010 season, Houshmandzadeh was cut by Carroll and Schneider and his career continued to spiral downward.
Do you see the trend inside of this trend? It’s trend-ception, if you will.
Committing to poor decisions
Pete Carroll and John Schneider parted ways with all three of the players mentioned. So why is it that they have also committed similarly poor decisions?
It’s simple, really – the superstars that can transcend their original team and succeed anywhere are either too impossible to get or have exceeded their prime by the time they get to you.
For Carroll and Schneider, they were aware of the risks they were taking. Harvin was infamous for being injury prone, and Jimmy Graham had a reputation for being soft and a disgruntled employee.
Both players backed up these inferences in Seattle, marking both their tenures a disaster for a team with dynasty dreams.
The one rare occurrence in which such a trade has succeeded for the Seahawks was the Lynch deal. However, the compensation in that trade was nowhere near what the Hawks gave up for Harvin and Graham.
The Jimmy Graham problem
In the case of Graham, the wound of Super Bowl XLIX was still very fresh for the Seahawks. They wanted a true red zone target who could make that catch in that situation.
The problem was, the Seahawks never got back to that moment and it signaled the beginning of their current fall from grace.
Schneider and Carroll didn’t learn from their first mistake with Harvin and sent the Saints a first round pick and their best offensive lineman to the Saints for Graham and a fourth rounder.
Considering the price, it seemed that Graham would become a cornerstone in the Seahawks’ offense. Instead, it was immediately clear that Graham wasn’t a fit for the Seahawks’ scheme and his success in New Orleans would never properly translate.
The Sheldon Richardson problem
Once these failures began to leak out into the defense with the acquisition of Sheldon Richardson last season, it was apparent that Carroll and Schneider had lost their identity a bit. They were, more or less, abandoning the idea of drafting and developing players in favor of buying high on established NFL talent in hopes of finding the next Marshawn Lynch.
Perhaps it was an act of desperation to get one more Super Bowl out of their original core, but it was too late.
Thankfully, the Seahawks seem to be rectifying these issues in 2018 and returning to what they started back in 2010.
While they did add a big name in Brandon Marshall, he didn’t cost them anything and therefore cannot be compared to Harvin or Graham in any way. If he succeeds, though, good on Carroll and Schneider. If not, it’s not a big deal.
Next: The Seahawks are going to have *what* record?
The best route to building a championship team is not by adding superstars, it’s by developing personnel to fit what you do. There’s a reason the two best receivers for the Seahawks in the last decade have been Doug Baldwin and Jermaine Kerase, who both went undrafted. Hopefully the Seahawks now recognize this because there is no longer room for such errors.