The Seattle Seahawks are 8-8 and could still make the playoffs this season. They would need to beat the Arizona Cardinals in Week 18 and then have the Chicago Bears beat the Green Bay Packers. But would there be any expectation for Seattle to win a playoff game?
Seattle seems to be good enough to beat teams worse than they are but not good enough to beat better teams, except for the Philadelphia Eagles in Week 15 though the Eagles are greatly struggling currently. Seattle's defense simply is once again so bad they cannot help out an offense that most of the time is good enough to win games.
Seattle was once 5-2 this year but has a real chance of finishing the season 3-7. Plus, that 5-2 record was a bit of a lie. Seattle beat the Cleveland Browns when Cleveland had a third-string quarterback playing. Finishing 8-9 would be unacceptable and the following four players would definitely deserve a lot of blame for what went wrong.
No. 1 - Seattle Seahawks right guard Phil Haynes
After playing double-digit games for the first time in his career in 2022, Seattle re-signed Phil Haynes for one year with a cap hit of $4 million. Like with Will Dissly in 2022, however, Seattle seemed to be bidding against itself for Haynes' services and the Seahawks still lost. Haynes had been oft-injured in his career and not overly good when he did play. He looked a little better than he was in 2022 because he was splitting snaps with fellow right guard Gabe Jackson and Jackson was atrocious.
Haynes played eight games in 2023 and was eventually beaten out, when Haynes was healthy, by rookie Anthony Bradford. Bradford was not good in his first year but Haynes barely graded better than Bradford, per Pro Football Focus (subscription required), even though Haynes now has five years in Seattle's system. Both Haynes and Bradford were terrible in pass protection, but Bradford only has a cap hit of $950,997 this year and just $4,643,988 total over the four years of his current contract.
Haynes got worse as his year went on as well. In his first three games, he allowed just one pressure and one sack. In his next five, he allowed 4 sacks and 11 total pressures. Haynes was also penalized an astonishing 6 times this year. Plus, those were the accepted penalties. He was flagged two more times that were declined. There is no way Seattle should even think of bringing Haynes back in 2024
No. 2 - Safety Jamal Adams
I feel like I am writing every other day in some negative way about Jamal Adams. I do not know him personally so everything I write about has something to do with how well (or poorly) Adams is going about his football life. And as that relates to the Seattle Seahawks, Adams must feel like every day is Christmas Day because when he wakes up he knows he has another $30,137. That's what Adams current contract would pay him each day over 365 days.
The great thing for Adams is that his paycheck is about to go up. Even if the Seahawks release the oft-injured safety, he is due to make nearly $20 million. As Adams doesn't seem to mind simply going home if he isn't going to play in a game, as he did when he left Lumen Field after learning he was not going to play in Week 15 against the Philadelphia Eagles, maybe he can go home and simply count his money.
Adams has lost most of the explosiveness he had in 2020 when he had 14 quarterback hits and 9.5 sacks and since that year he has no sacks and just 5 quarterback hits. He always has been bad in coverage but he is getting worse there as well. He allowed a career-high 111.7 quarterback rating when targeted this season. 25 of the 31 passes thrown in his direction were completed and Adams gave up 2 touchdowns.
Adams was graded as the 15th-worst safety in the league this year, per PFF. The only reason Adams wasn't graded lower is that PFF gave him a good pass-rush grade. This is a little confusing, however, as Adams only had 7 total pressures. Also, Adams missed 24.2 percent of his tackle attempts this year which is by far the worst mark of his career.
No. 3 - Edge rusher Darrell Taylor
Darrell Taylor is still on his rookie deal and he only has a cap hit of $2,152,343. But that's about $2,152,343 too much. Taylor is set to be a restricted free agent in 2024 due to him missing his rookie year with a leg injury. If Seattle brings Taylor back, which is likely, they shouldn't pay him very much. He is a one-trick pony but he isn't consistently very good at that one trick.
Taylor has 20.5 sacks in his three years over 48 games. Those sacks have happened over 19 games, but the issue is that Taylor will go long stretches without a sack or making any pass-rush impact at all. In 2021, Taylor went through a stretch of only having 2 sacks in 10 games between Weeks 6 and 17. In 2022 between Weeks 8 and 13, Taylor recorded a statistic in one of four games and that was an assisted tackle. This season, Taylor had zero quarterback hits in his first five games and hasn't had one in the last four games.
Plus, Taylor can only rush the passer consistently well. He is awful against the run. Ideally, he would be a third down edge rusher on obvious passing downs. Maybe Seattle tried to use him that way this season, but Uchenna Nwosu got injured in Week 7 and Taylor had to play more. It's no coincidence that Seattle's run defense has been the worst in the league since Nwosu got hurt.
It should be noted out of fairness that in the last four games, Taylor's snaps have dipped a bit. Likely this is because the Seahawks realized Taylor was incapable of truly helping much. The wise thing would be for Seattle to place a tender on Taylor and see if he signs elsewhere. But the Seahawks should not place a high tender on Taylor because no team is likely to bite on adding Taylor if they have to give up a second-round pick.
No. 4 - Safety Quandre Diggs
Diggs has been a good leader in the locker room for a roster getting ever younger over the last couple of years. He is a well-liked and well-respected part of the team. But he does appear to be slowing some. 2023 has been Diggs' worst season since he was traded to the Seahawks in 2019 and it isn't close. In 2024, though, Diggs will be almost 32 years old by the end of the season, and he has a cap hit of $21,262,500.
Diggs has graded, per PFF, even worse than Jamal Adams this year. The free safety's grade makes him the 10th-worst safety in the NFL. 70.4 percent of the passes tossed his way in 2023 have been completed, the highest number since he came to Seattle. If he gives up 8 passing yards in Week 18, he will have allowed his most passing yards in a Seahawks uniform. Worse is that 92 of the 244 yards he has allowed have been after the catch, by far his most since 2018.
Diggs also is missing more tackles this year which could be a sign he is slowing. He has missed 17.8 percent of his tackle attempts, his most with Seattle and his second-worst number since he was a rookie in 2015. Diggs also had had multiple interceptions every season since 2017 but he only has one this year.
Diggs will probably make a great coach one day, if he wants to go in that direction. But he is simply too expensive to bring back in 2024 and Seattle would save $11 million by releasing him. Seattle might just need to start over at safety next year, except for Julian Love who has been solid in 2023.
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