Richard Sherman says the quiet part out loud about Seahawks move

The Seattle Seahawks are taking some heat after Kenneth Walker III chose the Kansas City Chiefs in free agency, leaving the Seahawks without their Super Bowl MVP going into next year. In fact, the Seahawks lost perhaps a few too many free agents, but Walker's loss is garnering the most attention.

Walker's departure also creates a massive hole in Seattle's offensive backfield that GM John Schneider will have to address in the next few days, because a quarterback's best friend is a reliable running back, and right now the Seahawks don't have one for Sam Darnold. 

Walker's exit and the exits of Seattle's other free agents may or may not significantly hurt the team next season; only time will tell. That said, while the Seahawks are taking criticism, Richard Sherman was quick to defend his former team for letting Walker walk, citing future franchise decisions around money as the reason, and, according to him, Seattle made the right call.

Richard Sherman believes the Seattle Seahawks will have to give up a lot of money down the road

The Seahawks aside for a moment, Walker going to the Chiefs is something Sherman loved, predicting that the newly signed running back would play well for them.

Considering Walker shared the load as part of a duo-back system in Seattle, he'll now be the primary No. 1 back in Kansas City, and the workload will be predominantly his. Unfortunately, Seahawks fans might see the best version of Walker in a Chiefs uniform. 

As for the Seahawks and the criticism they're taking on, it would have been virtually impossible to keep some of their more high-profile free agents (Rashid Shaheed not included) because of who Schneider will have to pay in the future. Sherman, speaking on his podcast, The Richard Sherman Podcast, explained this week why. 

“They lose the Super Bowl MVP, which is something I predicted because of the number that he was going to get to," Sherman said. “I thought other teams, like the Kansas City Chiefs, would be higher on him and have a higher number. And he gets what I believe is the highest per year for a free agent running back in the history of the National Football League at $15 million a year. And he deserves it.

“Could the Seattle Seahawks maintain and keep all the guys that they’re going to have to pay [Devon] Witherspoon and JSN [Jaxon Smith-Njigba], and all the rest of the guys who they are going to have to shell out some money, too, and keep K9 [Kenneth Walker]? I don’t think they would."

Sherman is absolutely correct. Smith-Njigba, whether this summer or next, is going to receive a massive pay load from the Seahawks, and like Walker's deal with the Chiefs, JSN will be deserving of every dollar the Seahawks give him. Of course, as Sherman alluded to, JSN is not the only player the Seahawks need to keep some money around for in the future. 

Considering the amount Kansas City gave Walker, and who the Seahawks have to pay down the road, letting Walker leave was the right decision, so the criticism about Schneider and the Seahawks is misguided. That said, it does force Schnieder to have to hunt for another option and pay up differently, because Zach Charbonnett isn't coming back in time for the Seahawks' new season.