Seahawks transfer of power almost complete

The Seahawks have made some very conscious moves over the last two years to keep the players who will help them. They kept team-first guys.

There is very little difference between how Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and Patriots coach Bill Belichick go about making up their teams’ rosters. Both coaches are good at the x’s and o’s and both are defensive coaches, but who stays on the team and who goes has a lot to do with how well each player buys into the team itself.

Belichick, of course, might put on a sour face and look scornfully upon the press. Carroll, meanwhile, exudes positivity. But make no mistake. At the end of the day, both coaches will choose a player who will be more willing to sacrifice for team over individual. This explains Seattle key personnel moves from the last two years.

Gone are productive guys like Earl Thomas, Richard Sherman and Michael Bennett. Kam Chancellor left too, but his reason for being let go by the Seahawks has a lot more to do with being injured than in him thinking he was more important than the rest of the roster. The same could not be said of Thomas, Sherman and Bennett.

There is a bog reason that Seattle chose to let Thomas, Sherman and Bennett walk and re-sign Russell Wilson and Bobby Wagner and K.J. Wright. Wilson and Wagner and Wright are great players on the field but they also will not detract from the locker room. Wilson and Wagner are leaders to young Seattle players while Thomas and Sherman and Bennett were not.

Carroll and general manager John Schneider clearly made a decision to sign players that respect the team. During the Carroll-Schneider era they chose rarely to extend a players contract prior to the year the contract was up. This year, Schneider extended Wilson and Wagner, both of who have contracts up after this year and not now. This isn’t a mistake.

The truth is, Wilson and Wagner are great players and are going to help Seattle win football games for several more seasons. But the Seahawks always like to have a young roster and Wilson and Wagner are going to teach and lead those players. They are the true power in Seattle now and the stars of Sherman and Thomas and Bennett have burned out.