Spring of hope has suddenly entered Seahawks winter of discontent

Every fanbase of every team everywhere hopes their favorite team will do positive things to be good the next season. The Seahawks have done the opposite in nearly every way possible.

Seattle and 12s suffered through an extremely disappointing 7-10 season in 2021. Disappointing because the Seahawks are almost always pretty good. But they finished last in the NFC West this past year and the way 2022 is shaping up the team could finish last in the NFC. Seattle doesn’t look very good.

The issue is that heading into this offseason, even with Russell Wilson on the team before he was traded, Seattle was in good shape with cap space. 12s could assume Bobby Wagner was going to be released or restructured – his $20 million deal for 2022 was too expensive, especially when compared to the fact Seattle would save $16 million by releasing him – and the Seahawks would have even more space.

Seahawks could be facing a bleak future

This should have been a spring for 12s to be happy even after the Wilson trade. Seattle could sign top-end free agents but also have high draft picks. Maybe the team was going to retool, but a full rebuild? Did not seem likely. Now the rebuild is underway and Seattle has done little to truly improve the team in 2022 and beyond.

Seattle re-signed several of its own free agents and players like Quandre Diggs and Rashaad Penny can be good. That is great but they were already on the team. From other teams, Seattle has signed Uchenna Nwosu from the Chargers, a promising young edge rusher who has yet to have a truly big season, cornerback Artie Burns, who really hasn’t been that good in several NFL seasons, and brought back defensive lineman Quinton Jefferson after he was away for two years.

Seattle did add tight end Noah Fant, defensive lineman Shelby Harris and quarterback Drew Lock in the trade with the Broncos for Wilson. Fant is promising, Harris is 30 years old and Lock hasn’t been good.

At the same time, the Seahawks for some reason released Carlos Dunlap, Kerry Hyder and Benson Mayowa. The plan may have been to get younger but Seattle hasn’t really and Dunlap was good when played correctly last year.

But Seattle has watched obtainable players like Matt Ryan and Terron Armstead and J.C. Jackson go to other teams and Seattle didn’t seem even interested in getting them. What exactly is Seattle’s plan for the future because it seems like there isn’t one?

So now most of the hope for a better future for the Seahawks lies in making smart draft picks and Seattle hasn’t had many great drafts since early in the 2010s. Trading Wilson is fine if there is an aggressive plan on how to replace him. The same could be said for every other player, including D.J. Reed, that Seattle has lost this offseason.

But any hope that Seattle would for once be active players in free agency has not developed. Neither has a clear vision to be better in 2022. The team is worse, much worse. But 2023 seems fairly hopeless as well, especially in the tough NFC West. The only thing that John Schneider and Pete Carroll have seemingly done this offseason so far is to set the franchise up for many years of losing.