Colby Parkinson leaving Seahawks will hurt twice as much

There was little chance Colby Parkinson was going to return to the Seattle Seahawks in free agency. He had been underused for the last three seasons he has been healthy and appears athletically gifted enough to be a dangerous receiver. He has shown he can run after he makes a catch as well. He should have been better with Seattle and the fault is the team's, not Parkinson's.

If you were Parkinson, even knowing that Seattle is going a different direction with the offense as the team has a new head coach, Mike Macdonald, and a new offensive coordinator, Ryan Grubb, would you have returned to Seattle? There was a decent chance had Parkinson returned, he would have had more chances to catch passes. But after his recent years of not getting his chances, he should not be blamed for not trusting the Seahawks' process.

But what makes matters worse for Seattle is that Parkinson is leaving in free agency and signing with the Los Angeles Rams, according to ESPN's Adam Schefter. The deal is for three years and $22.5 million with $15.5 million of that guaranteed. $7 million is a good bump in pay for Parkinson, but that also implies the Rams are expecting the tight end to be productive.

Colby Parkinson is leaving the Seattle Seahawks for the Rams

But Parkinson likely did not want to disrespect the Seahawks by leaving in free agency and signing with an NFC West rival. He went to high school in Westlake Village, California, which is about an hour west of downtown Los Angeles. Parkinson probably also safely assumes that Rams head coach Sean McVay will put him in the best situations to succeed.

Still, seeing Parkinson in a different uniform twice a year is going to sting. He is almost certainly going to be more productive than he was in Seattle and some of that productivity is going to come against the Seahawks.

He seems like a good guy and 12s should hope he does well. But maybe only well in 15 of 17 regular season games. Maybe he can take the Seahawks games off in 2024.

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