3 Ravens that Mike Macdonald could bring with him to the Seattle Seahawks
Macdonald and any one of these three players could significantly improve the Seahawks defense.
By Lee Vowell
The Detroit Lions and Baltimore Ravens both lost on Sunday in their respective conference championship games. This is likely good and bad for most Seattle Seahawks fans. Most of us might not care about the AFC so much, be a lot of us probably want the San Francisco 49ers to lose. But the Lions and Ravens losing means Seattle is free to interview coaches Ben Johnson of Detroit and Mike Macdonald of Baltimore.
Both coaches looked solid in the championship games even though their teams lost. Johnson's Lions scored 31 points and had 442 total yards (6.1 yards per play) against a very good 49ers defense. Macdonald's Ravens allowed 17 points against the Chiefs but none in the second half and just 319 total yards.
The question for Seattle is whether they potentially want to go with Johnson or Macdonald and hire a first-time NFL head coach or if Seattle wants to possibly hire Dan Quinn. There are only two teams that need head coaches right now so Seattle should have its choice of almost any coach. If they choose Macdonald, he potentially could try to bring these three Ravens with him.
Seattle Seahawks should think of signing linebacker Patrick Queen
Before I go on, I should point out that while I can be an idiot I am not trying to say that the Seahawks can sign all three of the players on this list. Just one of the players would make Seattle's defense better especially as the player would already know what Macdonald wants from his defenses. There is a possibility that once Seattle clears so cap room they could sign two of these players but definitely not all three.
But I will start with Patrick Queen as the Seahawks literally have no proven inside linebackers currently on the 2024 roster. Bobby Wagner, Jordyn Brooks, and Devin Bush are all free agents. Seattle should be happy to see Bush leave and re-sign Brooks, but Wagner is the biggest question. He was good in 2023 but is aging. Queen and Brooks would form a formidable ILB duo and Queen is also just 24 years old.
Queen does not have any real weaknesses and he would instantly be Seattle's best coverage linebacker. While that has been a problem for the Seahawks defense for a number of years, a coaching change to Macdonald should remedy this issue. Queen also has 48 total pressures over the last two years, second-best among inside linebackers in the league. Seattle would just need to clear space to pay Queen what Pro Football Focus (subscription required) estimates as $72.5 million over four years for Queen's next deal.
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