Seahawks best ever draft picks by round

The NFL combine is upon us. What better time to look at which draft picks the Seahawks have ever made by round?

For football fans, if the NFL Draft is like Christmas, then the NFL combine is a bit like Christmas Eve. Seahawks fans might more closely watch on Sunday as that is the day that linebackers and defensive linemen work out. Seattle needs an edge rusher badly (just like everyone else in the NFL). But is an edge rusher among the best picks Seattle has ever made?

This list was a bit difficult. It might have been easier to do four or five pages of first round picks because Seattle has drafted several Hall of Fame players in that round. Of course, first rounders are supposed to be good. But I had to choose one player as the best of the franchises’s first round picks and don’t hate me if you think I am wrong.

Seattle has recently done really well with fifth round picks so that was a tough choice too. The John Schneider-Pete Carroll era alone has seen several fifth rounds choices become All Pros and possibly potential Hall of Fame players.

I did stick with only seven rounds, however, as that is the current format for NFL drafts. Plus, wouldn’t you be a bit bored by me going 12 rounds? There are only so many Don Dows and John McVeighs you can take. I also didn’t involve undrafted free agents because they aren’t draft picks, they are free agents.

Without further ado, here are the Seahawks’ best picks by round in the history of the franchise.

Round Seven

John Harris never made a Pro Bowl, surprisingly enough. But in eight years with the Seahawks he had 41 interceptions and ran two back for touchdowns. In 1981, he had 10 interceptions which was second in the NFL. And still this guy didn’t make the Pro Bowl? Weird.

1981 was also a year he teamed up with Hall of Fame strong safety Kenny Easley to form one of the best safety duos in the NFL. Even before there was an Earl Thomas-Kam Chancellor partnership, there was a Harris and Easley one. Seattle should be proud of the tradition it has with safety play.

After being chosen in the seventh round of 1978 draft out of Arizona State, Harris played in 119 games for Seattle and is still currently third on the team’s all-time list for interceptions.

Honorable mentions

Seattle has had a decent amount of seventh-round draft picks do well. None of them are yet Hall of Fame players, but several have been productive. And one of them is currently on the roster and one of the Seahawks’ best players.

Michael McCrary

McCrary was taken in the 1993 draft. He played four seasons in Seattle, finally getting a chance to start in his fourth season. In 1996, McCrary had 13.5 sacks for the Seahawks.

Josh Brown

Brown seemed to play in the NFL since the inception of the league but he was chosen only in the 2003 draft. He played five of his seasons in Seattle and made 80 percent of his field goal attempts.

Chris Carson

Carson was taken in the 2017 and has a lot of good football still left to play. In 2018, he led Seattle in rushing and could easily do the same for the next several years. It might be safe to say that if this same list is done in 10 years, Carson would be the Seahawks best seventh-round pick ever.

Round Six

Round six does not have a history of producing great Seahawks. Michael Sinclair is the best of the group. It says a lot that his next closest competitor for who was Seattle best ever sixth-round choice is not that close to him.

Sinclair last played in Seattle 18 years ago but still ranks second in Seattle’s history with 73.5 sacks. That number includes a combined 41.5 between 1996 and 1998 with 16.5 of the sacks coming in 1998. That year Sinclair led the NFL in sacks. Sinclair also forced a league-leading six fumbles in 1998 to go along with 55 tackles.

Sinclair was a three-time Pro Bowler, all between his best years of 1996-98. After his playing career he was an assistant coach in the Canadian Football League for five seasons and then spent one year as the defensive line coach of the Chicago Bears in 2014. Sinclair has been out of professional coaching since.

Honorable mention

Beyond Sinclair, the next best sixth-round pick for the Seahawks was probably Byron Maxwell. Maxwell spent parts of five years in Seattle. In 2013 he had four interceptions and in 2013 he started 12 games. He returned again in 2017 but had his career cut short because of injury.

Round Five

The history of Seahawks success in round five has been a new one. Every special player that Seattle has taken has come in the Schneider-Carroll era beginning in 2010.

2010 was the year that Seattle chosen Kam Chancellor. A year later Seattle would take Richard Sherman in the fifth round as well. But I have Chancellor as the better pick because he embodied what the Legion of Boom was. Chancellor was physical and athletic and intimidated opposing receivers from crossing freely over the middle of the field.

Chancellor, of course, was lost to injury in week 10 against the Cardinals in 2017. He is not expected to play again. But the two-time All-Pro still is apart of the team and helps with young players developing their game. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Chancellor remain a part of the Seahawks for a long time to come in some capacity.

Honorable mentions

Richard Sherman was a shutdown corner for Seattle from 2011 through 2017 before leaving after being released. He currently plays for the San Francisco 49ers. Should Seattle have held on to him longer? Maybe. But his attitude was seen as a detriment in the locker room. This is something Chancellor would never have been accused of.

And while it is still really early to judge him, punter Michael Dickson was taken in last year’s fifth round and in his rookie season was named All-Pro. Dickson could be a defensive weapon in Seattle for the next 10 years.

Round Four

It is interesting that round four has not been a better round for the Seahawks. No offense to Chris Warren as he is worthy of being considered the best of nearly any round. But after Warren, there isn’t a lot to choose from.

Warren, however, had four straight years between 1992 and 1995 of rushing for over 1,000 yards after being drafted in 1990. He ranked third in the NFL in rushing in 1994 with 1,545 yards. In 1995 he was second in the league in rushing touchdowns with 15.

Warren was a Pro Bowler between 1993 and 1995. He is one yard better than Curt Warner to rank second all time in Seahawks rushing with 6,706 yards and finished with 52 touchdowns running. This last statistic ranks third in Seattle history.

Warren currently helps by coaching players for Edison High in Alexandria, Virginia.

Honorable mentions

K.J. Wright was taken in the fourth round in 2011 and has paired with Bobby Wagner to form one of the best linebacking duos in the NFL. Wright is currently a free agent. But his skill and personality make 12s hope he can return to play in Seattle for the next several years.

Red Bryant was taken in the fifth round of the 2008 draft. Seattle could have used a player like Bryant the last two seasons and Bryant was excellent in stopping the run. Bryant has been out of football since 2015.

Round Three

So, um, yeah. Round three was an easy choice. How anyone could say that any other player but Russell Wilson is a better round three choice in Seahawks history would be completely, and probably knowingly, wrong.

Wilson has led Seattle to the franchises’s only Super Bowl win in the 2013 season. Seattle then went back to the Super Bowl the next year. Wilson has been to five Pro Bowls in his seven seasons.

By the end of 2019, if Wilson stays healthy, he will be the franchise leading passing yards thrown. He needs 3,810 yards to pass Matt Hasselbeck. Wilson is already the franchise leader in touchdowns thrown (196). He accomplished that in nearly 1,000 fewer passes than Hasselbeck. Wilson’s quarterback rating of 100.3 is second all-time in the history of the NFL.

Seattle would simply not have had the run of success they have had over most of the last decade without Russell Wilson as their quarterback.

Honorable mention

Even better for Wilson and Seahawks fans is that possibly the next best third round pick in Seahawks history is wide receiver Tyler Lockett. In 2018, when Wilson targeted Lockett he had a perfect quarterback rating of 158.3. Lockett has already been a Pro Bowl returner but showed enough last season to make 12s think he could be a Pro Bowl receiver one year soon as well.

Round Two

The Seahawks have nearly as many excellent round two picks as they do round one choices, but the quality isn’t the same. Except for Bobby Wagner. Wagner is having a Hall of Fame career after being chosen in 2012. He is a five-time Pro Bowler and four-time First Team All-Pro. Wagner is the best linebacker in the NFL.

In 2016, Wagner had one of the greatest seasons for a linebacker in NFL history with a league-leading 168 tackles, along with 4.5 sacks and an interception.

After Sherman and Chancellor stopped playing for Seattle in 2017, Wagner became the unquestioned leader of the defense. In 2018, Seattle’s defense ranked 11th in the league in scoring which was much better than most people would have predicted. A lot of the reason for the success of the defense can be attributed to Wagner’s performance and leadership.

Wagner is currently signed through 2019 but will be just 29 years old when the 2019 season begins. He should be a Seahawk for many more years.

Honorable mentions

Seattle has two other players currently on the team that are worthy of being mentioned for best second round choice, Frank Clark and Jarran Reed. Clark was taken in 2015 and had 13 sacks in 2018. He is a free agent that the Seahawks must resign this offseason.

Reed was taken in 2016 and had 10.5 sacks in 2018. Like Wagner, he is a free agent after 2019 and will need to get paid by Seattle. Hopefully, the team is already talking extension with Reed’s people.

Three previous players should also get mentioned here. Brian Blades (1988) was one of Seattle’s best receivers for a decade. Lofa Tatupu (2005) was a tackling machine. Seattle trading Max Unger (2009) for Jimmy Graham was a mistake that changed the focus of the offense. Unger would have made Seattle better over the last few years.

Round one

As I mentioned earlier, picking a best of round one pick in Seahawks history was difficult. But Walter Jones was the most dominant Seahawks player ever. In NFL.com’s Gil Brandt’s list of best left tackles in NFL history, Jones ranked fourth. Jones started all 180 games of his NFL career, spending every season with Seattle.

He was a nine-time Pro Blower and a four-time First Team All-Pro. His ability was a big reason Seattle got to the Super Bowl in 2005.

The odd thing was that while Jones was a first round pick, he was the second pick by the Seahawks the year he was chosen in 1997. Jones went sixth overall but Shawn Springs went third. Springs was decent too, but he was not Jones. Nor was anyone else in Seattle lore.

Honorable mentions

There are quite a few important players who should be written about here. Two players, Kenny Easley (1981) and Cortez Kennedy (1990) made the Hall of Fame. Easley’s career mirrored Chancellor’s in many ways. Both were dominant tacklers and intimidators. And both had their careers cut short by injury.

Earl Thomas may make the Hall of Fame one day too. He was taken in the first round in 2010.

Three other Seahawks taken in the first round were excellent for their career as well, Shaun Alexander (2000), Curt Warner (1983) and Jacob Green (1980). None of the last three will make the Hall of Fame like the previous four mentioned. But without them, Seattle would have been a lesser franchise.