At the risk of tempting fate, I’m going to recount some of the more cringeworthy moments of Seattle Seahawks draft history. I feel comfortable doing this because we have seen general manager John Schneider build – not just one, but two distinct Super Bowl-winning rosters during his time in Seattle.
The first was accomplished working side-by-side with Pete Carroll during those heady days in the early 2010s. Then, after some fallow years, Schneider did it again, both with and without Carroll’s input.
Those fallow years are sort of the point of today’s remembrance. As fans gear up to see what new players Schneider and his scouts will be adding to a championship roster, it is important to remember that no one bats one-thousand in the draft.
Simply finding steady professional players with about half your picks is pretty good. Sneaking in several blue chippers—pro bowlers and above – can really elevate a roster to contender status.
Who are the Seattle Seahawks’ worst all-time draft picks?
Schneider, like all GMs, has hits and misses on his resume. In selecting which of the misses are truly awful – as opposed to garden variety bad picks – I’m considering when the pick was made and what kind of talent was skipped over.
Therefore, nothing from later rounds will be on this list. Seahawks draft classes are littered with late-round picks who never made it onto the field during a regular season NFL game, but that is no mark of dishonor. That’s simply a numbers game.
I’m also going to try to factor in injury. For instance, offensive tackle Chris McIntosh, chosen 22nd overall in 2000, was out of the league in two years. But he was a pretty good player as a rookie before recurring neck injuries forced a premature end to his career. 2004 first-rounder Marcus Tubbs was another pick that looks bad in hindsight due primarily to injuries.
The first pick in franchise history suffered a similar fate. Notre Dame’s Steve Niehaus’ career was a major disappointment. He was the second overall pick in 1976, one pick after Hall of Famer Leroy Selmon, and a few picks before Hall of Famer Mike Haynes. Niehaus didn’t make the Hall of Fame. 20 career starts over four seasons don’t earn you a spot in Canton.
But Niehaus was the NFC Defensive Rookie of the Year in ’76, beating out Selmon for the honor. Injuries cut a promising career far too short.
I won’t be choosing anyone from that ’76 inaugural class, but I do want to mention it. As an expansion team, the Seahawks were awarded eight picks in the first 100 of the draft. GM John Thompson didn’t really knock it out of the park. Aside from Niehaus and running back Sherman Smith, none of those early picks did much for the club.
I will not be including the likes of Jeff Lloyd, Rick Engles, Steve Myer, or Don Bitterlich – all of whom were drafted in those top 100 picks – in this countdown because Seattle's entire roster was well below-average. It can be hard to evaluate a football player when the entire team struggles to compete.
I will however, reserve my one special honorable mention for Bitterlich, the diminutive placekicker from Temple. He has a special place in Seahawk history, having scored the team’s first points on a 27-yard field goal in their very first game.
He also converted all three of his extra points. He made several extra points in the ensuing weeks but sadly missed all of his subsequent field goal attempts. By week five, John Leypoldt was the new Seattle kicker, and Bitterlich never attempted another kick in an NFL game.
But that was a minor misstep compared to the these eight swings and misses.
8. Aaron Curry, round one, pick four in 2009
Putting Curry at eight is my way of making a little bit of a point. Maybe he should be considered worse.
After all, he was one of the highest overall picks in franchise history, and his numbers for Seattle – 5.5 sacks and 156 tackles in three seasons - were well below what was expected. But my sense is that part of the disdain associated with the Curry pick grows out of his summer holdout and the exorbitant contract he eventually signed.
I don’t really count that against him as a draft pick. He was a perfectly normal player – not nearly good enough to justify the draft pedigree but not the worst choice ever.
Players chosen within the ten picks after Curry in 2009: four-time Pro Bowl linebacker Brian Orakpo; three-time Pro Bowl cornerback Malcolm Jenkins
Linebackers chosen later in the draft: 2009 DROY Brian Cushing (pick #15), six-time Pro Bowler Clay Matthews (pick #26)
7. Andre Hines, round two, pick 44 in 1980
By 1980, GM Thompson had yet to build much of a team in the northwest, but at least the Seahawks were developing some continuity. Hines, a tall, rangy offensive tackle out of Stanford, was slated to take over a spot on the line opposite young vet Steve August.
But after serving as a backup in his rookie season, Seattle went with Ron Essink, chosen more than 200 spots after Hines in the 1980 draft, and Hines was never heard from again.
Players chosen within the ten picks after Hines in 1980: Hall of Fame center Dwight Stevenson; Irv Pankey, who started more than 100 games at left tackle during a 10-year career with the Rams
Offensive linemen chosen later in the draft: Keith Bishop, Pro Bowl guard from Denver (pick #157); Tunch Ilkin, Pro Bowl tackle for Pittsburgh (pick #165)
6. Malik McDowell, round two, pick 35 in 2017
The Carroll/Schneider magic of the early part of the decade seemed to evaporate late in the 2010s. McDowell’s legacy is complicated by a serious ATV accident that derailed his career before it ever got started.
However, McDowell had other issues that made his unfortunate story one of self-sabotage and not simply bad luck. Substance abuse issues and several arrests ensured he would never play a down for the team that drafted him.
That injury may have been a crucial factor in his eventual downfall, so maybe it is hard to pin it all on Carroll and Schneider. But the mere fact that such a talent slipped into the second round to begin with suggests there were concerns, and it is easy to assume that a coach like Carroll would have figured he could mentor his young player past all that. Turns out, he couldn’t.
Players chosen within the ten picks after McDowell in 2017: All-Pro safety Budda Baker, Pro Bowl running back Dalvin Cook
Defensive tackles chosen later in the draft: Grover Stewart (pick #144) and Davon Godchaux (pick #178), both of whom have more than 400 career tackles, compared to McDowell’s 33.
5. Owen Gill, round two, pick 53 in 1985
Gill was the Seahawks highest pick in 1985, so maybe there’s a little extra disappointment attached. He started one game in the backfield during his two years with the Hawks and gained fewer than 500 yards. Even worse, he had absurdly poor receiving stats for a running back, catching well under 50% of his targets.
He was out of the league within three years, but I cut the pick just a tiny bit of slack because it was a bad year draft overall, and particularly bad for running backs. Gill was as good or better than the back chosen before him (Greg Allen at #35) and after him (Ricky Moore at #75).
Players chosen within the ten picks after Gill in 1985: Frank Reich, who played 13 seasons as a (mostly-backup) quarterback (pick #57), Kirk Loudermilk, who started 150 NFL games at center Minnesota and Indianapolis.
Running backs chosen later in the draft: four-time Pro Bowler Rob Wolfley (pick #103), two-time second-team All-Pro Herschel Walker (pick #113)
4. Brian Bosworth, supplemental draft, round one, 1987)
If we’re just looking at production, Bosworth was essentially Aaron Curry. Probably not quite as good. He lasted a few years, played 24 games, and got run over by Bo Jackson. For that, the Seahawks gave up a first-round draft pick the following year. Bosworth was 95% hype, and GM Mike McCormack fell for it. Both would be out of the league by 1990.
Players chosen within the ten picks after Seahawks forfeited pick (#20) in 1988: four-time Pro Bowl linebacker Chris Spielman (pick #29), Hall-of-Fame cornerback Eric Allen (pick #30)
Linebackers chosen later in the draft: three-time Pro Bowler Ken Norton (pick #41), two-time Pro Bowler Bill Romanowksi (pick #80)
3. LJ Collier, round one, pick 29 in 2019
Collier is still in the league, and he had a perfectly average season for Arizona a couple of years ago. But he was a serious disappointment in Seattle. Four seasons, 16 total starts. Check my math, but I think that is four stars per year for a first-round draft pick.
Three total sacks. 40 total tackles. You could expect that kind of production from a priority UDFA. But what makes him a truly awful pick is revealed by the defensive ends that came later in the draft.
Players chosen within the ten picks after Collier in 2019: Pro Bowl cornerback Byron Murphy Jr. (pick #33), first-team All-Pro receiver Deebo Samuel (pick #36)
Defensive ends chosen later in the draft: two-time All-Pro Zach Allen (pick #65), five-time Pro Bowler Maxx Crosby (pick #106)
2. D’Wayne Eskridge, round two, pick #56 in 2021
Eskridge was the highest pick in the disaster that was 2021. Because he was chosen in the 50s, maybe this is too high a ranking for him. True, he was awful – a success rate on targets of under 30% (insanely low) and a measly 3.6 yards-per-target.
As a kick returner, where he was supposed to really shine, he broke one long return out of fifty. But he is ranked this high because of the receivers who were still available when Schneider and Carroll picked Eskridge.
Players chosen within the ten picks after Eskridge in 2021: Two-time Super Bowl Champion starter Nick Bolton (pick #58), two-time All-Pro and two-time Super Bowl Champion starter Creed Humphrey
Wide receivers chosen after Eskridge in 2021: two-time Pro Bowler Nico Collins (pick #89). Two-time All-Pro and four time Pro Bowler Amon-Ra St. Brown (pick #112)
1. Dan McGwire, round one, pick #16 in 1991
I could almost see cutting the McGwire pick a little slack. Teams have to take fliers on quarterbacks from time to time. And even though he was very bad in Seattle – starting just five games in his four seasons and throwing three times as many interceptions as touchdowns - the fact is there just weren’t good quarterbacks available in the ’91 draft.
Sure, McGwire was terrible, but so was the other first-rounder chosen that year, Todd Marinovich. Second-round pick Browning Nagle, who tragically died this past week after battling cancer, was no better. There were no gems to be found late in the draft in 1991. Yep – if it weren’t for just one other QB, I could see sliding McGwire up a spot or two. But keep reading if you need a reminder.
Players chosen within the ten picks after McGwire in 1991: first-team All-Pro linebacker Alfred Williams (pick #18), first-team All-Pro defensive tackle Ted Washington (pick #25)
Quarterbacks chosen after McGwire in 1991: there was only one. Hall of Famer Brett Favre (pick #33). Reportedly, there was a debate between the coach and the GM over which QB to take. The GM won. Seattle, which had a winning record in six of the eight years before ’91, would go almost the entire decade without finishing over .500. Let's hope no one gets added to this list this year.
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