Three moves the Seahawks still need to make

Salary cap resolution

After the Clowney and Griffen deals, Seattle is roughly $16 million over the cap. Seattle needs about $12 million in cap space to fit their draft pool, practice squad and injury reserve monies. All in all, they need to clear roughly $28 million in cap space.

A key piece to note: The contracts for Luke Willson, Bruce Irvin and Chance Warmack have not yet been released. From what I have read, it sounds like Luke Willson and Chance Warmack are both veteran minimum contracts. I will be using $850,000 plugs for these two. Bruce Irvin will likely sign for a deal near where he signed last year. That will get him right around $4 million. 

Cap space (start):                             -$16 million

Release Justin Britt                           $8.5 million

Release Ed Dickson                          $3 million

Release Tedric Thompson              $2.1 million

Release Branden Jackson               $2.1 million

Restructure Russell Wilson           $13 million

Cap space (end):                               $12.7 million

Let’s break down these moves from the top:

B.J. Finney’s most natural position comes at the center. Seattle signed Finney to a 2-year, $8 million contract. It’s clear given the money, they view him as a starter. Justin Britt has the 4th largest cap hits amongst centers in 2020 and is coming off a serious injury. This is an unfortunate, yet necessary release to make.

Ed Dickson was always going to be released. Then Seattle signed Greg Olsen, and re-signed Jacob Hollister. This became a move pretty much written into stone. A tight end room consisting of Will Dissly, Greg Olsen and Jacob Hollister is more than enough to go into the regular season with. Ed Dickson is a foregone conclusion to be released.

Reports came out that Tedric Thompson received some mild trade interest last year around the trade deadline. Seattle elected to hold onto him. Unfortunately, he was injured just a couple weeks later, and he lost his starting job to Quandre Diggs. Recently, Seattle granted Thompson the opportunity to seek a trade, however, it’s unlikely anything will materialize due to the injury. I fully expect Thompson to be released in the next couple weeks.

Branden Jackson was re-signed as a restricted free agent just several days ago. This move was an insurance policy in case Seattle lost out on both Clowney and Griffen. In this scenario, both were signed, and Seattle could save the full $2.1 if Jackson were to be released. That is simply too much money tied to a reserve player.

The final move I made was to restructure Russell Wilson’s contract. I essentially converted his base salary for the 2020 NFL season into a signing bonus. This bonus will be allocated over the next 3 years of his deal in terms of salary cap hits.

As you can see, the salary cap is very malleable. While Seattle doesn’t presently have much cap space ($3 million in useable cap space). There is no reason to think they still can’t be aggressive in the market. Through savvy contract structuring, and roster cuts Seattle can turn their current salary cap of $3 million (after the Bruce Irvin, Cedric Ogbuehi, Brandon Shell, Chance Warmack and Luke Willson are taken into account) into Jadeveon Clowney, Everson Griffen and $12 million in cap space. This would be just enough to fund the draft pool, practice squad players and the injury reserve net.