The Seattle Seahawks’ 2023 season may end today, depending on how things go in Arizona and at Lambeau Field this afternoon. When it’s over the team will have some choices to make, including at the top of the organization.
According to Ian Rapoport and Tom Pelissero at NFL.com, Pete Carroll’s contract runs through 2024 and has an option in 2025. They also have a note that states the team is always evaluating and updating contingency plans in case Carroll decides to walk away.
“The Seahawks always are evaluating and updating contingency plans in the event longtime coach Pete Carroll, now 72 years old, decides to walk away. Seahawks chair Jody Allen usually meets with Carroll and general manager John Schneider in the days after the season concludes — which could be extended by a playoff run, with a win Sunday over the Cardinals plus a Packers loss to the Bears gets Seattle in — any decisions will wait until then. Carroll is under contract through 2024, with an option for 2025 that can be exercised in the offseason.”
If you were reading carefully, you noticed there isn’t any actual news here – aside from Carroll’s 2025 year being an option rather than a regular part of his contract as we originally were led to believe.
It’s of course possible that Carroll may decide to quit, but it would certainly come as a surprise. That’s also the only way he’ll be leaving, as the organization essentially decided to keep Carroll over Russell Wilson not even two years ago. The Seahawks are not going to fire him, even if they lose today and finish 8-9.
Carroll has been taking criticism this past week for his team’s loss to the Steelers, a game they were favored to win by 3.5 points going in. Missed tackles and atrocious decisions on fourth down were the main culprits in that loss, but penalties have also been a serious problem all season – one in which this team has underperformed its full potential by quite a bit.
Carroll’s track record of making the playoffs has also been aided by the expansion of the wild card seeds. If it were still only six teams per conference they wouldn’t have made the postseason since 2020.
Still, it would come as a shock if Carroll were to actually move on this offseason.
If the Seahawks are going to try something different, our best guess is that Carroll might get elevated into a different kind of job – more team president than day-to-day head coach, similar to the role Pat Riley has been in with the Miami Heat since 2008.
Carroll has energy and knowledge that the organization would be foolish to send packing – but if they’re ever going to get back to the Super Bowl history says they’ll need to do it with a different head coach. John Harbaugh has a good chance to buck the trend this year, but NFL coaches who win a Super Bowl then go a decade without one tend to never get back there.
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