The Seattle Seahawks have been one of the more successful franchises in the NFL since general manager John Schneider and head coach Pete Carroll joined the team in 2010. They have drafted some likely future Hall of Famers and made some trades that led to success. But free agency hasn’t always been Schneider’s forte.
On the list that follows of free agents that Schneider should have never signed, I don’t have a player that shows up on lists like these. That would be quarterback Matt Flynn. The fact that Flynn never was good with Seattle has more to do with the team drafting Russell Wilson in the same year that Flynn was signed. Otherwise, Flynn might have been OK as Seattle’s quarterback.
While the Seahawks did sign some quality free agents early on, players like Michael Bennett, by the time the mid-2010s came around some really bad free agents were signed. Some of those led to Seattle going from a Super Bowl contender to completely missing the playoffs. Here are the four worst free agent signings under John Schneider.
Seahawks’ worst free agent signing No. 4: Cornerback Ahkello Witherspoon
Here is the issue with Witherspoon. The Seahawks signed him in the 2021 offseason, paid him $2.5 million in a signing bonus, and then traded him before the season began to the Pittsburgh Steelers for a 2023 fifth-round draft pick. Basically, Seattle just gave free money to Witherspoon who never played a down for the team even though the Seahawks definitely had a need for quality at cornerback in 2021.
Witherspoon does get oft-injured and this might be a reason that a team doesn’t want to sign Witherspoon. But John Schneider didn’t care so much about this fact because Seattle did, in fact, take a chance on Witherspoon and never found out if he would get hurt with the team. Instead, Witherspoon went to Pittsburgh, played in nine games for the Steelers in 2021, had 3 interceptions in those nine games, and allowed a quarterback rating when targeted of only 35.1.
Of course, Witherspoon did end up hurt again in 2022 for Pittsburgh but he is still just 27 years old. Maybe Seattle would have been taking a chance on Witherspoon not getting injured had they not traded him. But the fact is, Seattle did take a chance on Witherspoon when they signed him in the first place and Witherspoon would have probably been pretty good for the Seahawks in 2021.
Seahawks’ worst free agent signing No. 3: Cornerback Cary Williams
Another signing that didn’t work out for Seattle but for a different reason than the one involving Witherspoon. After the 2014 season, Seattle was still in a position to be very good. The team had just come off back-to-back Super Bowls (should have been back-to-back victories, of course) and just needed to add even more talent to continue their streak of success. Instead, Schneider made one of the worst moves he has made as Seattle’s GM.
Seattle had Richard Sherman at one cornerback, still had excellent safeties Kam Chancellor and Earl Thomas, and just needed to find a solid replacement for cornerback Byron Maxwell. Cary Williams had been an OK player earlier in his career but he was turning 31 years old and that is getting ancient for a mediocre corner. Still, it seemed like Schneider and Pete Carroll thought Williams at the length to be a good fit in Seattle’s defensive scheme.
What Williams was really good at, however, was getting beat deep. Williams started 10 games for the Seahawks in 2015. His time in Seattle started off well enough as he recovered a fumble for a touchdown in his first game. That would be the highlight of his Seahawks career, though.
Seattle had signed Williams to a three-year deal worth up to $18 million. But he was so bad through 10 games – he allowed a quarterback rating of 120.6 plus a whopping 14.8 yards per reception – that Seattle gave up on Williams after 10 games and released him. Williams was paid $7 million in guaranteed money from the team. Moves like the signing of Williams led to the regression of success for Seattle from the 2013 and 2014 seasons.
Seahawks’ worst free agent signing No. 2: Left guard Luke Joeckel
Joeckel is a symbol of what Russell Wilson complained about when Wilson hints about a reason he wanted out of Seattle was that the team did not put good players in front of him to block oncoming pass rushers. The fact is, the Seahawks did draft more offensive linemen than most other teams during Wilson’s career with Seattle and tried to add what they thought were quality offensive linemen in free agency. But the great eye that Schneider has for knowing how good a quarterback can be does not transpose over the talent evaluation for offensive linemen.
Not until recently has Seattle truly had success in drafting quality linemen. 2022 rookie tackles Charles Cross and Abe Lucas look like they will be really good. Left guard Damien Lewis isn’t bad either. But those are too few examples when the Seahawks have mostly been failures at adding good linemen since 2010.
Before Joeckel came to Seattle he had underperformed and been injured a bunch with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Joeckel had only played four games for the Jaguars in 2016, the year before Schneider signed him to be a Seahawk. He had been a decent run-blocker at times but was not good in pass protection and Seattle’s offense was transitioning to being one that threw the ball a lot more.
Not only did Schneider make a poor choice about bringing Joeckel to Seattle at all in 2017, but Schneider also overpaid for him. The Seahawks signed Joeckel to a one-year deal worth up to $8 million. This was likely far more than another team was going to offer. Joeckel ended up playing 11 games and allowing 5 sacks and 28 pressures in 454 pass block attempts. That’s bad. And Joeckel was so bad he never played football again after 2017 and Seattle missed the playoffs in his only season with the team.
Seahawks’ worst free agent signing No. 1: Running back Eddie Lacy
2017 was simply a bad offseason for John Schneider. Not only did he sign Joeckel but he also made the serious mistake of adding running back Eddie Lacy. I would never say John Schneider is a lazy person because he is definitely not, but his specific evaluation of Lacy prior to bringing Lacy to the Seahawks seemed a bit lazy. Lacy was coming off a serious ankle injury in 2016 and it wasn’t clear if he was going to be right for the 2017 season, plus he had major conditioning concerns.
Lacy didn’t seem to want to be in shape. Therefore, one might question how badly he wanted to play football. The Seahawks, especially Pete Carroll, like to have players that play with the proverbial chip on their shoulders. Lacy was the complete opposite.
The way Schneider had to structure Lacy’s contract should have been a red flag to Schneider. The running back was signed to a one-year deal worth up to $4.25 million with $2.86 million of that being guaranteed. Most of the rest of the contract were built-in incentives to make sure Lacy stayed under a certain weight. Lacy didn’t make most of those guarantees. If you are having to pay a player to try to be in shape, you probably shouldn’t have that player on your team.
Lacy ended up playing in nine games in 2017 and only ran for 179 yards on 69 carries. That means his average rushing attempt was just 2.6 yards. Seattle was so poor at running the ball in 2017, partly due to the fact they thought Lacy could be a big part of the rushing attack, that Russell Wilson led the team in rushing yards with 586. This was 346 yards more than any running back. Like Joeckel, Lacy never played again in the NFL after 2017.