Seahawks should inquire about availability of Carlos Dunlap

What a Seahawks trade for Dunlap would look like

With Dunlap entering his age 31 season, he should be available for a reasonable price tag. The Bengals would be wise to focus on rebuilding the team around their new franchise QB. This means they should focus on building the team on the offensive side of the ball, both in terms of the draft and in salary cap use.

Meanwhile, Dunlap possesses the prototypical skill set to fill in for Clowney seamlessly. He has always been an elite run defender. However, through his time and experience he has gained the ability to effectively collapse the pocket and generate pressure on the QB. Seattle trades down 46 picks to efficiently plug their biggest weakness, the defensive end.

Seattle would acquire Dunlap and his remaining contract for the price of moving down 2 rounds in the draft. Overall, this would be good value for both teams. The Bengals could shed roughly $17.75 million over 2 years while moving up in the draft. The Seahawks would acquire a very accomplished edge rusher on a modest deal.

Carlos Dunlap’s contract after the trade:

Terms: 2 years, $17.75 million

Avg Salary: $8.875 million

Dead cap: $0 (we could cut ties anytime without anything being left on our books)

Cap hits by year:

   2020: $6.5 million

  2021: $11.25 million

The best part about the deal is that his year 1 cap hit is minimal. This would make the acquisition very palatable in terms of the absorbed contract. Just a quick review of where Seattle sits with salary cap before the trade:

Cap space: $14.6 million
Draft pool: $6.6 million
Practice Squad: $2.2 million
Injury Reserve: $2.5 million
“True Cap” $3.3 million

Where Seattle sits with the salary cap after the trade:

Cap space: $8.1 million
Draft pool: $6.4 million
Practice Squad: $2.2 million
Injury Reserve: $2.5 million
“True Cap” -$3 million

Seattle would need to shed some salary to make this work. Fortunately, it would be a very modest amount. The three most logical moves that could be had would be:

• Release Branden Jackson and recoup $2.1 million.
• Release Justin Britt and recoup $8.5 million.
• Restructure Russell Wilson‘s base salary into a signing bonus and recoup up to $12 million.

Any one of these moves could be done. They could even elect to just cut Branden Jackson, this would leave the team with a true cap of -$900k. If they traded back from pick #27 to recoup some later draft capital, to something in the ballpark of pick #34. This would be enough to get them back to a true cap of $0.