Tag: Seahawks mock draft

Seahawks address IOL in ESPN’s latest 2025 NFL Mock Draft

Seahawks address IOL in ESPN’s latest 2025 NFL Mock Draft

The interior of the Seattle Seahawks’ offensive line has undoubtedly been their weakness this season. Poor play, injuries, and unexpected retirements have led to constant lineup shakeups. Veteran center Connor Williams surprisingly retired in the middle of the season and was replaced by sophomore blocker Olu Oluwatimi. Right guard Anthony Bradford has struggled mightily and is currently on IR. He’s being replaced by sixth-round rookie Sataoa Laumea, who beat-out third-round rookie Christian Haynes for an opportunity.

NFL draft analyst Field Yates recently completed his latest 2025 NFL Mock Draft for ESPN. Yates has the Seahawks addressing their interior offensive line by selecting University of Alabama guard Tyler Booker with the No. 23 overall pick.

“The Seahawks have had to shuffle the interior of the offensive line this season, and I expect them to address guard and center in the offseason,” Yates wrote. (There isn’t a surefire first-round center.) “Booker is a tone-setter with excellent size and power. He holds up well in pass protection, surrendering two pressures and zero sacks all season. Those pass-blocking traits would help Seattle, which has given up 40 sacks (ninth most) and has Laken Tomlinson potentially hitting free agency.”

Yates is spot on with his analysis. Veteran left guard Laken Tomlinson is slated to reach unrestricted free agency and hasn’t played particularly well in Seattle this season. Pro Football Focus currently has assigned him an overall grade of 63.9. General manager John Schneider still has issues to sort through at center and right guard. Are Oluwatami and Laumea/Haynes long-term answers?

Adding Booker to the mix would improve Seattle’s biggest weakness on offense.

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Seahawks address offensive line in latest 2025 NFL Mock Draft

Seahawks address offensive line in latest 2025 NFL Mock Draft

The struggling offensive line is the biggest weakness for the 4-5 Seattle Seahawks. The offense has forfeited a sixth-worst 28 sacks heading into the Week 10 bye. Starting quarterback Geno Smith has been pressured on 153 of his dropbacks, according to Pro Football Focus.

The right side of the offensive line has particularly been an issue. Right guard Anthony Bradford has allowed 24 pressures, second-most among 113 qualifying guards. Bradford has also been whistled for a position-high nine penalties, and he’s allowed five sacks, ranking 110th out of 113. Yet rookie blocker Christian Haynes hasn’t been successful in dethroning him for a starting role.

Right tackle has been equally as questionable. With preferred starter Abe Lucas still on the Physically Unable To Perform (PUP) list, the Seahawks have played three different players there, due to additional injuries and underperformance. George Fant and Stone Forsythe have been particularly disappointing, thrusting Day Three rookie Mike Jerrell into action.

It’s no surprise that an NFL Mock Draft would have the Seahawks selecting an offensive lineman. The Draft Network’s Daniel Harms recently dropped his iteration. He has GM John Schneider selecting Purdue offensive tackle Marcus Mbow with the No. 13 overall selection.

“Watching the offensive line in Seattle is a tough task, and if they want to bring in a young quarterback at any point, addressing the offensive line is top of the list,” Harms wrote. “Marcus Mbow is one of the best tackles most don’t know about and he could complete Seattle’s bookends with some of the best hand usage out there.”

The Seahawks could certainly use reinforcements on the offensive line ahead of the 2025 campaign. Whether Mbow plays tackle or guard at the next level remains to be determined, but he’s an underrated prospect. Depending on Lucas’ outlook, Seattle could utilize instant contributors at both positions.

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Seahawks land elite 2-way prospect in latest ESPN 2025 NFL Mock Draft

Seahawks land elite 2-way prospect in latest ESPN 2025 NFL Mock Draft

The Seattle Seahawks are preparing for the 2024 NFL season, and that means the 2025 NFL Draft is inching closer. With Week 0 of the new college football campaign kicking off Saturday, ESPN insider Field Yates felt it was an appropriate time to release his first mock draft. Yates has the Seahawks picking 11th overall. The draft order was determined by ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI), which uses simulations to predict the season.

And with the No. 11 overall selection in Yates’ 2025 NFL Mock Draft, the Seattle Seahawks select, Travis Hunter, cornerback/wide receiver, Colorado.

“There will be intense debate over whether Hunter is best suited to be a full-time receiver, a full-time cornerback or some combination of both,” Yates wrote. “I don’t know the answer myself right now, but I do know he’s one of the most talented playmakers I’ve studied in some time. That said, Seattle might lean into Hunter more on defense given its building blocks already in place at wideout, teaming him up with Devon Witherspoon and Riq Woolen.”

Whether Hunter is a receiver or cornerback at the next level could dominate pre-draft headlines next Spring. It would represent an especially interesting conundrum for the Seahawks, because they’re extremely deep at both positions. Defensive minded head coach Mike Macdonald could see Hunter playing cornerback, filling out a trio at the position that already includes Witherspoon and Woolen.

On the flip side, Seattle could possess a more pressing need at receiver next offseason. All-time franchise great Tyler Lockett is entering his age 32 season and there could be a discussion next summer regarding whether or not he’s a cap casualty (he’ll be heading into a contract year). As a receiver, Hunter could join D.K. Metcalf and Jaxon Smith-Njigba.

Hunter recorded 57 receptions for 721 yards and five touchdowns as a receiver for the Buffaloes last season. As a cornerback, the Suwanee, Georgia native contributed 30 tackles, eight pass breakups, and three interceptions.

The bigger question/concern is why the Seahawks are picking 11th overall in this mock-draft exercise!

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2024 NFL mock draft: Seahawks go best player available in 3-round projections

The Seahawks still have a lot of work to do if they’re going to catch up with the true contenders around the league.

The Seahawks still have a lot of work to do if they’re going to catch up with the true contenders around the league. Most of all, that will require a good haul of prospects in the 2024 NFL draft. If they can pull it off, that would make three-straight strong draft classes by Seattle for the first time since the formative Legion of Boom years in 2010-2012.

It’s easier said than done, but if the Seahawks can manage a true Best Player Available strategy in the draft, it would certainly help. Going into our latest mock, we aimed to trade down a couple times to improve the quality of our picks, if not necessarily the quantity. Once on the clock we stuck to a strict best player available approach – drafting the highest-ranked player on the board regardless of position with two small exceptions: no running backs and no double-dipping at any one position.

In the end, we dramatically improved both the offensive and defensive line units with two good prospects coming in for each. Here’s the full 100-pick mock.

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Seahawks supercharge edge rush in this 7-round mock draft

With that thought in mind, we went into our latest mock draft looking to boost the edge rush rotation as much as possible…

Under new Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald, the Ravens had the best defensive unit in the NFL this past season. The main reason they were so successful was a dominant pass rush, as Baltimore led the league in sacks. While Seattle didn’t have a bad pass rush by any means, there’s still a lot of room to improve to catch up with teams like the Ravens and 49ers. Upgrading in this department should be one of the top priorities for the front office this year.

There are a few different ways they can do that. For one, Macdonald’s schematic innovations will have to account for at least some of the improvement. Getting better pass rushers will also have to be part of the equation. In our 10-point blueprint for the offseason we wanted the Seahawks to target former Ravens edges Jadeveon Clowney and Kyle Van Noy in free agency.

While we still like that idea – especially considering how much they cost Baltimore in 2023 – there’s also a case to continue the team’s ongoing youth movement at key positions rather than signing veterans.

With that thought in mind, we went into our latest seven-round Seahawks mock draft looking to boost the edge rush rotation as much as possible…

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Seahawks go EDGE, QB with first picks in this 2024 NFL mock draft

As it happens, the 2024 NFL draft is loaded with quality quarterback prospects.

Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith just had what we feel was the best game of his career. To perform the way he did under the circumstances shows that this franchise has a serious competitor starting for them who can occasionally elevate his game to an elite level, even under the worst conditions. Smith was so good last Thursday night that we’ve had to reevaluate which direction the front office should take this coming offseason. Rolling with Geno as QB1 when next season starts should still be the default, no matter how these next five games play out.

However, keeping Smith as the starter going into 2024 should not and cannot stop the Seahawks from searching for other potential future franchise QBs. The need to keep churning at the game’s most important position is one of the main reasons why this team has been one of the most consistently successful since the Matt Hasselbeck era began. If they’d been content to stick with Tarvaris Jackson they wouldn’t have drafted Russell Wilson, and if they’d stood pat then they wouldn’t have found Geno Smith, who’s the main reason the 2023 Seahawks are even remotely competitive despite some serious coaching issues on both sides of the ball.

As it happens, the 2024 NFL draft is loaded with quality quarterback prospects. Top prospects like Caleb Williams from USC and Drake Maye from North Carolina will be out of reach unless they trade up, but there are nearly a dozen other interesting QBs in this class who have the potential to develop into starters at the next level. It’s so loaded that Seattle has three in their own backyard – Washington’s Michael Penix, Oregon’s Bo Nix and Washington State’s Cam Ward are all worth a serious look. So are Jayden Daniels (LSU), Shedeur Sanders (Colorado), J.J. McCarthy (Michigan), Spencer Rattler (South Carolina), KJ Jefferson (Arkansas), and Tua Tagovailoa’s younger brother Taulia at Maryland.

In our latest seven-round mock for the Seahawks we decided to roll the dice on yet another highly-promising 2024 QB prospect…

Seahawks go all-defense in this 2024 NFL mock draft

Instead, we focused this mock draft entirely on defense.

The Seahawks may have lost a huge game on Thursday night, but we saw a whole lot to like on the field. The Cowboys are one of the most well-rounded teams in the NFL this season and a serious Super Bowl contender, and Seattle took them all the way down to the wire. Most encouraging was the performance by veteran quarterback Geno Smith, who had the best game of his career despite facing a near-constant onslaught by the Dallas pass rush. Some people believe Smith’s awesome outing secured himself the QB1 job, at least at the outset of next season.

We’re not quite there yet, but what this game does definitively prove is that these Seahawks can hang with the best teams in the league. However, they’re going to need to make some adjustments before they start actually beating opponents on that level. Most of those changes may need to be schematic in nature, because it’s hard to find places on this roster outside of the trenches that truly need to be upgraded. We can’t mock a new front office or coaching staff, so we have to do the best we can projecting how to get the right kind of help in next year’s draft.

Considering that they just dropped 35 points on a top-five defense that had their pass rush firing on all cylinders, we decided that their offensive personnel is perfectly fine where it is. Instead, we focused this mock draft entirely on defense. Here’s how it went down.