How the Seahawks can dominate Phase 3 of Free Agency

Adding free agents

At $30 million (depending on Bobby Wagner’s deal), the team can still spend big on somebody like Ansah or Suh. Or possibly get as many as 3 solid contributors. The Seahawks need help primarily at edge rusher and Ansah and Perry have already been linked to Seattle. Snagging both is in the cards.

But what if the team decided it wanted to add Suh or Wilkerson as well? Could they afford that? The answer is, probably. Things would get tight at that point, but believe it or not, Seattle can create even more cap space pretty easily.

Doug Baldwin is all but confirmed to be retiring. He will probably find a settlement with the Seahawks to pay him a portion of his 2019 bonus, but a June 1 cut of Baldwin adds roughly $10 million of cap space to this year.

Kam Chancellor will also be cut after June 1, saving the team another $5 million. So right away, the Seahawks have cleared $15 million without losing anybody who was in their 2019 plans. Then, if Seattle wanted to go even bigger, cutting Jaron Brown and Barkevious Mingo, who happen to play the 2 positions the Seahawks invested most heavily in during the draft, would save the team an additional $7 million.

The Seahawks can add an additional $22 million of cap space to their already confirmed purse of $25 million by parting ways with 4 players who are either never going to play again or have already had their replacements selected.

With $47 million in cap space, Seattle can afford to extend Bobby and Jarran, and likely add 3, if not 4 of the big names left in free agency. Think about a defensive line that had L.J. Collier, Wilkerson, Reed, Suh, Poona Ford, Ansah, Perry, and Jacob Martin on its depth chart. Pretty fun to think about right?

All of these options will be available to the Seahawks in the next week. After May 8th, free agent signings no longer count against the compensatory draft pick formula, meaning the Seahawks can keep their 4 comp picks and still add talent starting next week. All that is required is a little patience and a touch of sacrifice.

Will Schneider and the Seahawks be aggressive in Phase 3 of free agency? Yes. How aggressive will they be? We will just have to wait and see.