It's still early in Seattle Seahawks training camp. Day 4, for instance, was the first day that players wore pads. This meant more contact, and got 12s one step closer to real football. Seattle's first preseason game of 2025 is in a bit over a week against the Las Vegas Raiders.
Some players continued to prove that the hype about them is real. The defense, expected to be the reason Seattle has any chance of making the playoffs this season, was great. But rookie Nick Emmanwori showed once again that he is seemingly ready to help in Week 1 of the regular season.
Emmanwori has impressed coaches during offseason workouts and in training camp with his speed, but, more importantly, his ability to be versatile. He is a safety in name, and can likely play either free or strong safety well, once he completely understands head coach Mike Macdonald's coverages, but the team is trusting him to line up as an edge rusher, too.
Nick Emmanwori makes playing defense look easy in Seattle Seahawks training camp
This is going to help Macdonald disguise his defensive alignments even more, but Emmanwori athletic ability is so good that even if the Seahawks don't change out of a pre-snap set, the defensive play call should work well. Better yet, though, is the opposing offense not knowing what Emmanwori is going to do.
This was the case during one drill when rookie quarterback Jalen Milroe was attempting a pass near his own goal line. Milroe thought he had an open receiver in the flat, but he didn't pick up on Emmanwori. The safety had lined up as an edge rusher, but instead of attempting to pressure the quarterback, he dropped into coverage.
Rookies Nick Emmanwori—and Jalen Milroe—learn how Mike Macdonald’s #Seahawks defensive schemes fool.
— Gregg Bell (@gbellseattle) July 28, 2025
Emmanwori lined up on line as edge rusher for offense play off own goal line. QB Milroe doesn’t notice him drop into coverage. Emmanwori picks off Milroe in flat for easy pick 6
The quarterback threw the ball to where he didn't think Emmanwori was going to be, and the safety-turned-edge rusher intercepted the pass and ran the interception into the end zone for a pick-six. It was the kind of play one can imagine Emmanwori doing several times in his career.
And none of that would have been possible without his versatility, but also that he clearly has a high football IQ, where he knows exactly what to do, even though he might be playing an unfamiliar position.
The flipside to the positivity of Nick Emmanwori, though, is that the play also showed the issues that many pundits saw Jalen Milroe having before the Seattle Seahawks chose him in the third round of the 2025 NFL draft. He didn't make great reads in college and forces the ball at times. Let's hope the play was more about Macdonald and Emmanwori's greatness than Milroe's deficiencies.