Seattle Seahawks: 3 things we learned from the 2021 season

Retain the nucleus 

The Seattle Seahawks are going to have a decent amount of money to spend in free agency. But, as Pete Carroll mentioned in his final presser, their first order of business will be to bring back their own. Just off the top of my head, players like Quandre Diggs, Duane Brown, Gerald Everett, D.J. Reed, Sidney Jones, Rasheem Green, Rashaad Penny should be resigned. Every single one of those players has proved at one point throughout this past season that they can make an impact on games.

Obviously, health plays a major factor in these contract negotiations because the best ability is availability. Yet, it is extremely hard to ignore what we just witnessed with Rashaad Penny and Quandre Diggs. All year long Quandre Diggs made plays in the backend. His leadership is underrated because it is not spoken about enough. But, he serves as an inspiration to his teammates. He and Jamal Adams can be a great safety combo for years to come if Diggs were to be retained.

Rashaad Penny showed when healthy, he is a top 5 back in this league. He moves extremely well for someone his size. He has the explosive ability to break off the home run while also possessing the trucking skills to bulldoze his way to a first down. If retained, he and Chris Carson can help each other get rest and keep a fresh set of legs. When healthy, those two have shown what they are capable of.

Despite good play from these players, another reason why you want to retain the nucleus is that these guys know each other. They have a good feel for each other on the field and luckily, most of them are young and still developing. D.J. Reed, Sidney Jones, Rashaad Penny, Rasheem Green are all getting started in their NFL careers.

Young talent is at a premium in this league. This core of players showed tremendous resiliency throughout a chaotic season and never once gave up. D.J. Reed started to play with more and more confidence as the season progressed. Rasheem Green started to really amp up the pressure on opposing quarterbacks.

Throughout the course of the season, these guys did enough to earn another contract with the Seahawks. In fact, Seattle can give themselves a chance at freeing up more money by extending some of their current guys and moving money around in those deals to acquire more talent this offseason. They haven’t really been big spenders in free agency over the years, but I would be on the lookout for them to bring in a game-changer or two on both sides of the ball.