WR is a buyer's market
Would you convert to a "receiver non-believer"?
Wide Receivers probably have the highest “attention per value” in the NFL.
This is the opposite of what teams want. It would be better to have the inverse, a high value-to-attention ratio, as this would mean that the team is getting the most bang for its buck.
Think of it like buying a sports car, or sorry to say it, an EV: These cars are rated as having the worst value in the market.
The value in these vehicles is in how they make you feel — “I feel powerful when I drive my Maserati.” “I feel like I’m doing my part by owning an electric vehicle” — but on a large scale, these cars are rated as having the worst resale value and the highest maintence costs.
(Sorry to my car enthusiasts, as I am stepping out of my comfort zone for this analogy so please let me know if I’m off.)
Similarly, a high-end wide receiver makes fans feel good about their team because they’re going to be on the receiving end of 90, 100, maybe even 120 plays per season, some of those being touchdowns.
But could you imagine if 8 of the NFL’s top 10 quarterbacks missed the playoffs? How about 16 of the top 20? What if the AFC/NFC Championship game quarterbacks were something like Bryce Young, Will Levis, Kyler Murray, and Sam Darnold?
Receivers hold an insane amount of entertainment value, possibly the highest mark in the league, but the $30-$35 million that teams are starting to spend on them now is wasted unless that team has most of the other pieces in place:
For years, receivers have been on a crash course with their own “don’t matter” debates and I think they’ve averted the crisis because a highlight catch is more entertaining than a first down run; for everyone one backwards hurdle, there are at least 100 “OBJ” one-handers. (Or thousands, I guess, since I’ve never seen a backwards hurdle before this season.)
But other than A.J. Brown, who had 3 catches for 24 yards in the Eagles first two playoff wins and it didn’t seem to even matter, the Super Bowl won’t feature any great receivers. No disrespect to DeVonta Smith (who is averaging 40 yards per game in the playoffs), Philadelphia could probably replace him overnight if they had to — the Eagles beat the Rams and the Ravens on the road in two games he missed.
With the 2025 receiver market shaping up in real time, pretty much any team could go out and get a starting “star” receiver in the offseason. And that should make good receivers fairly cheap. It also means that any team trying to offload a receiver — say Tyler Lockett or DK Metcalf — isn’t going to get full price on the dollar.
This opens up a bag of questions for the Seahawks, such as:
“Is Metcalf going to get cold feet about asking for an extension?”
“Could they just keep Metcalf and call his bluff if he holds out?”
“How easy and cheap would it be to replace Metcalf?”
“Do the Seahawks even need to worry about the receiver position while they still suck in the trenches?”
“How long will it take Lockett to find his next opportunity?”
To get the answers to those questions, let’s review all the free agents, the cap casualties, all the receivers who could end up on the trade block or are already there, and how that might compare to the Seahawks just drafting a receiver instead.
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It’s going to be a BUYER’S MARKET at receiver and that means that Seattle shouldn’t panic and most definitely should not overpay.