It's tough to get a good read on just how well the Seattle Seahawks will do this season. That's partly based on Seattle far exceeding how well many people thought they would do last year. But many times when a team does much better than anticipated, the success is due to many players having career years.
That wasn't really the case with Seattle last year. Sure, quarterback Geno Smith was a lot better than expected, but 2022 was the first season since 2014 that he had been given the QB1 role. Maybe Smith is just that good.
But for Seattle to have a great 2023, several players need to have big years. The second year guys also need to be a bit better than last year too. But the season could be decided by the following four players.
Seattle Seahawks edge rusher Darrell Taylor
Darrell Taylor is simply too inconsistent to be counted on as a top-end pass rusher. Thankfully, Seattle had Uchenna Nwosu in 2022 and he earned a contract extension through 2026 that he signed last week. Nwosu is good and you kind of know what he will do from week-to-week. As far as Taylor goes, however, he might be excellent for three games and then disappear for five.
There doesn't seem to be any reason for Taylor's inconsistency either. He works hard enough in practice, and he is still streamlining a few great pass rush moves. But against some teams they work and then against others, they don't. It's got to be maddening to the Seahawks coaches not know if Taylor is going to have a 2-sack game or not even record a statistic.
Taylor is an unrestricted free agent next year, and the Seahawks will likely place some kind of tender on him if he doesn't work out a new deal before next offseason. But to earn that new deal, he needs to show the Seahawks for most of the season that he is going to have a productive consistency. Taylor had 9.5 sacks last year, but 6.5 of those came in the final six games of the season. If Taylor can get to 13 sacks spread out over the season, he's going to make big bucks beginning in 2025, but otherwise, likely not.
Seattle Seahawks safety Jamal Adams
Jamal Adams just needs to play. If he can stay healthy and play close to how well he is capable of, he is going to be a very productive player. He probably won't ever get to 9.5 sacks again (as he did in 2020), but Seattle doesn't need him to. If he can play 13 or 14 games a season - expecting him to play an entire season ever again is probably out of the question - that's going to be enough for him to make a positive impact.
The issue with Adams, besides him seemingly always being hurt in recent years, is that his contract is already massive and his cap hit goes up nearly $5 million in 2024. If Seattle were to release him next offseason, the team would save $9,390,000 against the cap and have $14,220,000 in dead space. Eating that much won't be fun, but financially it still might make sense if Adams once again can't play much in 2023 because of injuries.
Adams, however, is an easy player to like. He clearly doesn't want to be hurt and he works like heck to try to get back on the field. He also appears to be a team-first guy who doesn't complain. Adams wants to be on the field and making a huge impact to help his team win games, not to glorify himself. And he is well-respected by his teammates.
I wouldn't want the Seahawks to release Jamal Adams, but the NFL can also be a harsh business. Unless Adams is on the field a bunch this season and playing well, paying him nearly $24 million in 2024 makes no financial sense. Plus, Seattle signed safety Julian Love this offseason to a two-year deal so Love could simply replace Adams full-time beginning the year after this one.
Seattle Seahawks tight end Noah Fant
Noah Fant is in the walk year of his rookie contract and can sign anywhere he wants to next offseason. There are several different ways Fant could view how he wants to work 2024. Does he want to go to a team that likely would use their tight ends more in the passing game so that his targets go up quite a bit more? Or is he comfortable in the Seahawks system and being on a team that could conceivably be a big winner as soon as 2024?
As faras the amount of targets go, Fant had 93 targets in Denver in 2020 and then 90 in 2021. That number plummeted in 2022, his first season in Seattle, to just 63. That wasn't due to anything Fant did as he was healthy and catching the ball at a 79.4 percent per target rate. He was playing well enough to have a big year if he had gotten more targets.
Fant isn't a bad blocker but his speed for his size and his ability to catch make him an ideal target for a team that likes throwing to its tight ends. Fant, for instance, would be a very good fit for the New England Patriots. And New England has more than enough cap space next offseason to make a run at Fant if they want to.
But if Fant can feast off of opposing defenses that could be focusing more on the Seattle wide receiver trio of Tyler Lockett, DK Metcalf, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba and leaving Fant more in single coverage, then the tight end could get closer to 80 targets and 60 catches and 700 yards and 8 touchdowns. But if he has numbers closer to 2022 - again, likely through no fault of his own but just the design of the Seattle offense - then his next contract will be effected and he likely won't want to stay with the Seahawks.
Seattle Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith
Geno Smith was signed to a three-year extension this past offseason but the deal is really a one-year prove-it-again contract. If Geno Smith isn't as good in 2023 as he was last year, the Seahawks can move on and look for another long-term quarterback. Next season, Smith would have a cap hit of $31,200,000 and a deac cap of $17,400,000 so Seattle would save almost $14 million by not bringing back in 2024.
Of course, the hope is that Geno Smith is even better this year than last, and there's no reason to think he won't be. He will have more weapons to work with since Seattle drafted Smith-Njigba and running back Zach Charbonnet, plus all the other productive offensive skill players return this year. Smith should have a better offensive line in front of him as well as we can assume that at least the center spot has been upgraded.
Since the Seahawks have been the only team to take a chance on Smith for several years now, we can probably assume that if he doesn't have a good season in 2023 then not many teams are going to be drooling over the prospect of bringing Smith to their team. That's a bit of shame in my opinion because Smith seems like a good guy and I hope he is a multi-time Pro Bowler.
And maybe he could be. Lots of people still doubt what they saw with their own eyes in 2022 and that Smith was really good. The statistics bear that out as well as he led the NFC in touchdown passes with 30 and led the entire NFL in completion percentage at 69.8. Basically, there aren't many quarterbacks in the NFC better than Smith. He might even be good enough to lead the Seahawks to a deep playoff run this year.