Russell Wilson, Seahawks reportedly deeply divided — could he be traded?
Are Russell Wilson and the Seattle Seahawks headed toward divorce?
It’s a thought that not long ago felt absurd to utter. Yet in the wake of offseason reports of an undercurrent of tension, now there’s an extensively researched report from The Athletic that suggests such a chasm might exist between the team and the star quarterback — and few seem to know how that tension will be eased.
According to the comprehensive report on Wilson and the Seahawks, there is a divide between what Wilson believes is best and what the Seahawks — namely head coach Pete Carroll — want to do offensively. Wilson reportedly has voiced his concerns and suggestions to Carroll and others in the organization, with both falling on deaf ears.
The words and actions of Wilson and Carroll suggests that there’s a tug of war in process, between a quarterback who views himself as the centerpiece of the operation and a coach whose long-held football tenets run anathema to allowing that quarterback truly thrive unchecked.
Who is right? That’s for others to decide. But ultimately it comes down to Wilson, who holds a no-trade clause in the contract extension he signed in April of 2018.
But would the Seahawks truly consider trading the quarterback who was inarguably an MVP front runner midway through the 2020 season? It feels like a long shot … until you unravel the years of tension that has been building in Seattle.
Russell Wilson stormed out of a team meeting last year
The story begins with the anecdote of Wilson and members of the Seahawks coaches prior to the Week 11 game against the Arizona Cardinals. Seattle had lost three of four games heading into the Thursday contest, and Wilson wanted to be heard about what he thought needed to be changed.
The coaches listened. But they rebuked his ideas, according to the report.
That led Wilson to “storm out of the room,” an incident that was viewed as a tipping point in the mounting tension between the two sides.
The Seahawks won that game and only lost once more down the stretch in the regular season. But following their first-round playoff exit, the divide only allegedly has grown.
Then again, it's clear that there's been tension for some time between the two camps.
The Super Bowl this year made Wilson angry
Another interesting element to the story is how Wilson attended this year’s Super Bowl between the Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers — and seethed watching it. Yes, Wilson wished he and not Brady was playing; that’s understandable for an elite competitor.
But Wilson viewed Brady as the icon who earned his freedom from the New England Patriots, was signed by the Bucs and given major say about personnel and scheme in his new surroundings.
Wilson even texted people during the Super Bowl to lament how little Brady was getting hit during the game and how that paled in comparison to himself, the most-sacked QB in the NFL since he entered the league in 2012. Over the past six seasons combined, Wilson has been sacked 275 times. The next-closest QB on that list is Matt Ryan, at 224.
Is this what Wilson now is hoping for? A way out — and a new franchise to give him similar carte blanche?
We don’t know for sure. But a CBS report the day after the Buccaneers beat the Chiefs suggested that Wilson’s “camp” was upset with Wilson’s pass protection. The following day, Wilson — who typically couches his public comments carefully — went on “The Dan Patrick Show” to air those same grievances.
“That’s a big thing that we gotta fix, that’s gotta be fixed,” Wilson said.
On a media conference call later that same day with Seattle media, Wilson doubled down: “I’m frustrated with getting hit too much,” he said.
Is it all the offensive line’s fault?
Critics of Wilson will say that he holds onto the ball too long, which results in some of the inflated sack numbers. There’s absolutely some truth to that.
There’s also the fact that the Seahawks had more salary-cap freedom to invest in the offensive line prior to his big-money extension, which now eats up a sizeable chunk of the team’s available money.
But it’s worth noting that the Seahawks have sunk significant capital into the line, drafting 14 OL prospects (even if only three were in the top two rounds) since the 2013 NFL draft after Wilson earned the starting role as a rookie the year before. The Seahawks also traded for left tackle Duane Brown, costing second- and third-round picks.
The real issue might be deeper than just the blockers. It also has a lot to do with the offense’s identity.
The idea of “Let Russ cook” took off among fans and media, the notion that Wilson actually had been held back by passive play calling that was too heavily dependent on Carroll’s philosophical preference to run the football more than many modern-day teams typically do.
At times, Wilson did cook. His numbers put him among the game’s QB elites. But the team too often was passive early in games, sometimes putting them behind the 8-ball — then and only then would Wilson be able to save the day, many argued. Never had it appeared more stark than in the Seahawks’ 2019 divisional-round loss to the Green Bay Packers when Seattle fell behind 21-3 and lost 28-23.
From that point on, Wilson has pushed back against the Seahawks’ passivity. It’s been met internally, according to the report, with dismissal.
But in the eyes of Carroll, Wilson's increased turnovers — he threw a career-high 13 interceptions in 2020, along with four lost fumbles — has been part of the reason for the team's increased reliance on the run game. Although Seattle ranked only 19th in rush attempts last season, it was also only 17th in pass attempts.
The contrasts were far more striking in 2018, when the Seahawks were dead last in pass attempts and second in rushing tries, and in 2019, when they ranked 23rd in pass attempts and third in rushes.
Could Russell Wilson really be traded? And if so, when?
The Athletic report doesn’t break a lot of new ground on this turf. The Wilson trade talk has paled in comparison to the feverish Deshaun Watson speculation.
But what’s notable is this: The Houston Texans have made it clear they have no interest — at this moment, at least — in trading Watson, a young star at the peak of his powers. The Seahawks largely have remained silent on the matter.
Wilson, for his part, has not said whether he truly thinks the Seahawks have any intention of moving him. But CBS has reported that a slew of teams could be legitimate contenders if Wilson is traded, including the Raiders, Dolphins, Saints and Jets. And following his discussion with Wilson, Dan Patrick later said the situation was “unsustainable.”
The problem here is that trading Wilson in the short term could cripple the Seahawks significantly. Doing so prior to June 1, per Spotrac, would incur a dead-cap hit for the Seahawks of a shocking $39 million and also immediately cause $7 million in additional cap costs. A trade after June 1 this year, however, would spread out that $39 million into split cap hits ($13 million in 2021, $26 million in 2022) and turn that $7 million expenditure into $19 million of cap relief.
So a trade is possible. But if the Seahawks want to figure out who their quarterback is, they’d be doing so after the 2021 NFL draft — and well after the initial wave of free agency — to help answer that question. It could severely limit the number of teams interested as well as the avenues toward replacing the franchise’s career passing leader and the only QB to lead the team to a Super Bowl victory.
But the fact that we’re even discussing such a possibility shows just how real this rift appears.
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