Official Training Camp Thread

[auroraave]

Nwosu signing a 3 year extension, 32m guaranteed, up to 59m. There was talk among pundits about cutting him for cash savings, I guess that puts that to bed. Dunno if this is value or overpay, but he had a great year and we definitely want him around and he definitely deserves to get paid.

I'm surprised people aren't talking this - this is a big deal. Not only locking him up, but creating some cap relief to sign our draft picks. This team desperately needs depth at the LB spot - especially with Brooks future uncertain. Smart move by JS.

[Sibelius Hindemith]

It may provide cap relief now, but that just means it will be a cap burden the final two years. I guess this means Darrell Taylor won't be back in any case.

Sounds like it was as much about his character/leadership potential as his football abilities.

[D-train]

By Bob Condotta
Seattle Times staff reporter
We’re getting down to it now with our Seahawks roster countdown in anticipation of training camp opening Wednesday, as we’ve reached the top 20 players. In our second-to-last installment, let’s look at players 20-11.

20. Punter Michael Dickson
Potential role in 2023: Starting punter.

Why he’s ranked here: Dickson, 27, has three years left on his contract, assuring Seattle it will have what is consistently about the best punting possible in the NFL. Dickson’s per-punt average of 47.57 yards is the best in NFL history.

19. Center Evan Brown
Potential role in 2023: Starting center.

Why he’s ranked here: Brown was a starting guard for the Lions a year ago, but the Seahawks view him as a center, where he started 12 games in 2021 for Detroit when he was ranked as the seventh-best pass-blocking center by Pro Football Focus. Brown will have to hold off rookie Olu Oluwatimi to win the job, and Brown’s contract — a one-year deal worth up to $2.25 million but with only $1 million guaranteed — doesn’t assure anything. But the early returns on Brown’s performance in the spring were encouraging, and he’ll enter camp with the center job his to lose.

18. Receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba
Potential role in 2023: A starter in three-receiver sets focusing on the slot position.

Why he’s ranked here: The 20th overall pick in the 2023 draft and the third-highest drafted receiver in team history, Smith-Njigba will have a big role in the offense. Smith-Njigba ran 83% of his snaps from the slot at Ohio State, according to Pro Football Focus, and he’ll likely start his Seattle career playing mostly there as well with Tyler Lockett and DK Metcalf on the outside.

17. Cornerback Devon Witherspoon
Potential role in 2023: Starting outside cornerback or nickel back.

Why he’s ranked here: The fifth overall pick in the draft — and the second-highest drafted corner in team history behind only Shawn Springs at three in 1997 — will undoubtedly have a major role this season. The only question is where, as Witherspoon was used as the nickel at the end of the offseason program, with coach Pete Carroll saying the team could use him there once the season begins. One intriguing thought is that Witherspoon could start on the outside in the base defense and then move inside in the nickel, thus being on the field full time but playing multiple roles — and with playing inside allowing the physicality that so enamored the team to be more of a factor.

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16. Tight end Noah Fant
Potential role in 2023: Co-starting tight end.

Why he’s ranked here: Fant returns for his second season in Seattle again expected to essentially share the starting role with Will Dissly. Fant, who was used in either the slot or split out wide 54.4% of the time last season, again projects to be more of the receiving tight end, with Dissly again used more in-line. The Seahawks, though, will be hoping to get a little more production out of Fant, who had 50 catches for 486 yards last season, down from 68 for 670 the year before with Denver.

15. Left guard Damien Lewis
Potential role in 2023: Starting left guard.

Why he’s ranked here: Lewis might have been one of Seattle’s more underrated players a year ago, with Pro Football Focus ranking him as the 11th-best guard in the NFL at the end of the year and ranked 19th as both a run and pass blocker. Lewis is also entering the final season of his four-year rookie deal and will be vying to turn in another strong season to earn a big contract next spring.

14. Right tackle Abraham Lucas
Potential role in 2023: Starting right tackle.

Why he’s ranked here: Lucas had a solid rookie season that did nothing to dissuade the idea he could be a fixture on Seattle’s offensive line for years to come. He was limited in the offseason program after having shoulder surgery. Assuming he’s healthy when camp begins, he’ll be back with the starters, serving as a bookend with fellow 2022 rookie Charles Cross.

13. Defensive tackle Jarran Reed
Potential role in 2023: Starting defensive tackle.

Why he’s ranked here: Reed, a second-round pick of the Seahawks in 2016, returned after one season in Kansas City and another in Green Bay on a two-year deal worth up to $9 million but with a cap number this year of just $3.03 million with the expectation that he will team with fellow free-agent signee Dre’Mont Jones as the starting tackles in the team’s base 3-4 defense. The Seahawks won’t be expecting the 10 1/2 sacks he had in 2018, but they are expecting that the duo of Reed and Jones will hold up better than what they had last season.

12. Tight end Will Dissly
Potential role in 2023: Co-starting tight end.

Why he’s ranked here: As noted in the item on Fant, Dissly projects to again play more as the in-line tight end with Fant used more in the slot and split out. Still, the Seahawks will also look for ways to get Dissly involved in the passing game — he had career highs of 34 receptions and 349 yards before suffering a knee injury that held him out the last two games. Dissly appeared to be fully healthy in the spring.

11. Safety Jamal Adams
Potential role in 2023: Once healthy, once again the starting strong safety.

Why he’s ranked here: The health and availability of Adams will be one of the big stories of the beginning of fall camp after he suffered a torn quad in the second quarter of the first game of the 2022 season. And once he’s healthy, the Seahawks hope to go back to the plan they had a year ago to move Adams around more and get him as close to the line of scrimmage as often as possible — alignments in which Julian Love could be used as the other deep safety along with Quandre Diggs. Adams carries the highest cap hit on the team this year at $18.1 million but has no guaranteed money in his deal after this year. So, it’s fair to say Adams is playing for his Seattle/NFL future this season.

[Sibelius Hindemith]

So the remaining 10 must be...

Walker
Cross
Woolen
Jones
Lockett
Diggs
Smith
Wagner
Metcalf
Nwosu

$100 to anyone that can put them in the correct order.

[Donn Beach]

It may provide cap relief now, but that just means it will be a cap burden the final two years. I guess this means Darrell Taylor won't be back in any case.

Sounds like it was as much about his character/leadership potential as his football abilities.

Thought character and leadership were what we are after these days.

[Sibelius Hindemith]

Sure, it's even more important with a young team. Just don't see how it's cap friendly though.

[Michael K.]

It may provide cap relief now, but that just means it will be a cap burden the final two years. I guess this means Darrell Taylor won't be back in any case.

Sounds like it was as much about his character/leadership potential as his football abilities.

I don't stress about this as much as others. The cap increases every year, and teams that are "in Cap Hell" always manage to somehow get out of it by moving money around. If they guy earns his money that will be a good thing. If he doesn't? They will figure it out.

[D-train]

And we’ve now come to the end of our Seahawks roster countdown. Which means two things — we are about to present the top 10 players on the countdown, and that training camp is now at hand, with the Seahawks set for their first on-field practice Wednesday afternoon.

10. Running back Kenneth Walker III
Potential role in 2023: Starting tailback.

Why he’s ranked here: Do running backs really matter? While that debate has been raging throughout the NFL of late, Pete Carroll has certainly given evidence to how much he thinks they matter with the investments the team has made in draft picks at the position through the years, including taking Walker in the second round in 2022. And certainly, the Seahawks seemed like a better team last year when Walker was running well, going 5-1 in games in which he rushed for 97 yards or more. Walker finished second in AP Offensive Rookie of the Year voting after rushing for 1,050 yards overall. He’ll be counted on to produce similarly in 2023, even though he now has the help of second-round pick Zach Charbonnet.

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9. Linebacker/edge Uchenna Nwosu
Potential role in 2023: Starting edge/outside linebacker.

Why he’s ranked here: Why he’s ranked here: Nwosu was everything the team hoped he’d be in the first season of his two-year deal worth up to $19.055 million he signed in 2022, tying for the team lead in sacks with 9.5 and leading the team with 26 quarterback hits, which was tied for ninth most in the NFL. But expectations for what Nwosu can produce will be even higher after he signed a three-year contract extension on Monday, with the total deal said to be worth up to $52 million, with $32 million reported as guaranteed.

8. Left tackle Charles Cross
Potential role in 2023: Starting left tackle.

Why he’s ranked here: After being taken ninth overall in 2022 with a pick acquired in the Russell Wilson deal, Cross showed every sign of being the best left tackle the team has had since Russell Okung left after the 2015 season (for now, comparisons to Walter Jones are still a little unfair). Cross played all but two kneel-down snaps last year in also displaying the kind of durability the Seahawks have so desperately craved at left tackle.

7. Cornerback Riq Woolen
Potential role in 2023: Starting right cornerback.

Why he’s ranked here: Woolen, now officially known as Riq on the team’s roster, was one of the surprise players in the NFL last season, going from the 153rd overall pick to becoming the first Seahawk rookie to make the Pro Bowl since Lofa Tatupu in 2005 and tying for the league lead in interceptions with six. But Woolen showed a little bit of rookie inconsistency, particularly in the playoff loss to the 49ers, meaning that for as good as he was a year ago, there’s still some room to grow, which can only excite the Seahawks that much more.

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6. Defensive lineman Dre’Mont Jones
Potential role in 2023: Starting defensive end.

Why he’s ranked here: Seattle’s attempt to remake its defensive line for the better this season was highlighted by the signing of Jones to a three-year contract worth just over $51 million, the most the Seahawks have ever paid an external free agent. The contract is written in a way that Seattle could easily get out of it after the second season and $34 million. But that doesn’t mitigate that the Seahawks have paid handsomely in the short-term in the hope that Jones will be the kind of dynamic playmaker up front Seattle has lacked most of the past five seasons.

5. Linebacker Bobby Wagner
Potential role in 2023: Starting middle linebacker.

Why he’s ranked here: Bobby’s back, if somehow you hadn’t heard, and expected to again man the middle of Seattle’s defense. We’ll see if the inevitable march of time — Wagner is now 33 — catches up to him in any way this season. Regardless, the Seahawks are banking heavily on his leadership and experience guiding the defense to smooth out some of the problems that arose a year ago.

4. Receiver Tyler Lockett
Potential role in 2023: Starting receiver,

Why he’s ranked here: Lockett, now 31, has no guaranteed money left on a contract that runs through 2025, and hugely escalating cap numbers the next two years — from $11.060 million in 2023 to $26.895 million in 2024 and 2025 — that in essence make this something of a prove-it year. But Lockett has shown nothing to indicate a drop-off is near, topping the 1,000-yard mark for the fourth straight season in 2022 while becoming the only player in the NFL with at least eight touchdown catches in each of the past five seasons.

3. Safety Quandre Diggs
Potential role in 2023: Starting free safety.

Why he’s ranked here: Diggs, whose $18.1 million cap hit is the second-highest on the team, showed his worth last season by being named to the Pro Bowl for a third straight season. He shook off some rust early in the year left over from an ankle/leg injury the year before to intercept four passes in the final seven games, including making the key play in the regular-season finale win against the Rams that got Seattle to the playoffs. Seattle is counting on another year of steady production and leadership from Diggs with a lot of other spots in the secondary still to be settled.

2. Receiver DK Metcalf
Potential role in 2023: Starting receiver.

Why he’s ranked here: Metcalf has the highest cap hit of any offensive player on the team this season at $13.72 million, and the Seahawks will be expecting another season of production on par with what got him that deal, even with the addition of Jaxon Smith-Njigba. To cite one stat that helped earn Metcalf that contract, he is the fifth player in NFL history to reach 50 receptions, 900 yards and five touchdowns in each of his first four seasons, the others being 1995 Seahawks first-round draft pick Joey Galloway, A.J. Green, Randy Moss, and Michael Thomas.

1. Quarterback Geno Smith
Potential role in 2023: Starting quarterback.

Why he’s ranked here: Smith being considered as the most valuable Seahawk a year after he was battling Drew Lock for the starting QB job? Well, this offseason has proved more than ever that quarterbacks are considered the most important player on any NFL team. And if a team has a good one, it goes an awful long way toward solving a lot of other problems. Smith showed in 2022 he is a QB an NFL team can win with. He got a contract rewarding him for that season, while also still structured in a way that the Seahawks can get out of it after the 2023 season if they want to. So, consider Smith both as now having the confidence to know he can be one of the best QBs in the NFL after what was essentially a seven-year layoff, while also still having something to prove. The Seahawks hope that will prove to be the best of both worlds.

[Michael K.]

So the remaining 10 must be...

Walker
Cross
Woolen
Jones
Lockett
Diggs
Smith
Wagner
Metcalf
Nwosu

$100 to anyone that can put them in the correct order.

I was bummed that I didn't see this in time, then realized I wouldn't have won anyway since there is probably no way I am putting Geno first. I realize he is the most important piece of those ten, but he is not the most talented. As a matter of fact, I would venture to say that we might be better off with Geno's backup if he gets hurt than we would be to have to replace either of our WRs or Cross. Probably even Wagner. We all saw the run defense last year. I don't get Geno at 1. Unless every team has their QB 1 because of the position?

[Sibelius Hindemith]

Yeah, i don't really like it either but who would you put there instead?