My Seahawks 2025 draft prediction

The Seahawks should trade up in the 2025 draft if this player falls

It’s been 28 years since the Seattle Seahawks traded up in the first round of the NFL Draft, but if the league lets the best football player in the class on this side of Travis Hunter slide out of the top-5, and it’s someone already dominating in a Mike Macdonald defense, then the stars have aligned for the franchise to make history on Thursday by making the biggest move of 2025.

Predicting that the Seahawks will trade into the top-10 for Michigan defensive tackle Mason Graham is a HUGE gamble, but if Seattle dips into their four day two picks (the most of any team) to move up for him and avoids settling for tier-two prospects, it would not be nearly as much of a risk.

The majority of this article is an argument for why the Seahawks should, could, and would trade up for Graham if he isn’t drafted by the Jacksonville Jaguars, a possibility that didn’t seem nearly as feasible until reports on Wednesday that actually DUVAL isn’t even really considering him.

As early as the Raiders at pick 6, trading up from 18 starts to look realistic and affordable (woo!) on Seattle’s end, while conveniently also aligning with several of his best friends in the league like Pete Carroll and Dan Morgan. The cost from 6, 7, 8, or 9 to 18 should NOT necessitate a first round pick in 2026, and honestly the Seahawks could stand to package their picks for a better return on day one than the expected prospects at their current spot.

Prospects who fall into Seattle’s lap rarely get better than Mason Graham. He’s the top-ranked defensive tackle by every analyst you know, he’s a consensus top-three football player in the class next to Hunter and Abdul Carter, and the league agrees that Graham will have an immediate impact in the NFL next season. Think “Will Anderson” but a defensive tackle.

However, I know how wild of a stretch it is to predict that the Seahawks will trade up for a specific player in the top-10 on Thursday, ending three decades of Seattle tradition to be among the most conservative teams on draft day, so I’m going to spare everyone who wants an answer that feels far more reachable than the stars and give you a more attainable answer first.

My Almost Picks + My Official Pick

I sort of dreamt that it would be Matthew Golden, so I don’t really need to make him official. I’ve always had this funny feeling about Donovan Ezeiruaku, but I’m not sold that he’s going to be seen as enough of a “steal” for Schneider to take him at 18. I wanted it to be Jihaad Campbell, but the shoulder injury scares me. Last year, I went against my instincts and didn’t make Murphy my official pick because I thought he was going to go too early. So I’m going to probably over-correct this year and choose someone who I think won’t be available.

My final official pick for the Seahawks in 2025 is: Michigan TE Colston Loveland.

Loveland hits all the marks as a prospect who the Seahawks would draft in the top-20 with the only exception being that he’s a tight end, a position that Seattle has only ever taken in the first round once before (Jerramy Stevens, 2002). But tight ends in today’s game are wholly different beasts than what they were for the first 80 years of professional football so history can’t quite help us there.

Now I hate to ever say that picking Loveland is a “boring” outcome, but next to what I teased in the beginning it would be. For Seahawks fans who don’t mind getting into the highly-speculative weeds with me for the next 10 minutes, this is why Loveland would be a great get for Seattle, but not the BEST PROSPECT OUT OF MICHIGAN if Schneider wants to take Thursday’s hugest swing.

The Mason Graham Theory

In the last 24 hours, Mason Graham has gone from the media’s “lock” to the Jaguars at 5 to losing his strangehold as a consensus top-10 pick. It does not mean that Graham won’t go top-10, and he could still go to the Jaguars, but there is no longer a perception that he’s completely off limits to teams picking after Jacksonville.

If the Seahawks see any opportunity to trade up for Graham without giving up an extra first round pick, they should not hesitate! Given their other day one options and the improbability that arguably the best prospect in the class would fall in their laps as an option, Graham is worth losing a second round pick and he makes too much sense for Mike Macdonald’s defense.

Is Graham really going to be available?

ESPN’s Peter Schrager, a guy who cares deeply about not being wrong and insists that his one mock draft per year is based on insider info, turned heads on Wednesday by having Graham fall to the Miami Dolphins at pick 13. As silly as it seems to reference the value of a mock draft, Schrager’s is notable because his is truly a one-of-a-kind prediction: I can’t find a single mock draft from a decent source that had Graham going lower than 11th to the 49ers — and even those are rare. What is Schrager trying to tell us?

ESPN’s Matt Miller followed suit, mocking Graham to the 49ers at 11. Wouldn’t it be logical to assume that the colleagues are sharing intel and that if Graham doesn’t go to the Jaguars that he’s a candidate to slide a few more spots after that?

Going a step further, Miller does not even have Graham as the first defensive tackle off of the board as he has the Panthers taking Walter Nolen. Yeah, it’s “lying season” and so on…and this is just a theory.

But if Graham really does get past the Panthers, the Seahawks start to make a lot of sense as a team that has the connections, the needs, the draft picks, and the motive to trade ahead of San Francisco for what could be John Schneider’s best opportunity to steal a blue chip prospect in this class. In fact, Schneider could try to trade over the Panthers by bargaining his abundance of day two picks.

I have spent 0 hours telling you about Mason Graham:

Graham has been compared to Christian Wilkins, which could play into Schrager and Miller’s reason for getting past the Raiders at 6 since Las Vegas is already paying Wilkins $27.5 million per year. However, prospects of Graham’s caliber are usually called fits for almost any team regardless of depth, which is why Seattle’s interest could be there despite already having a stacked defensive line with Murphy, Leonard Williams, and Jarran Reed.

But in a draft class is middle-heavy as 2025, it could be the perfect time to trade up for a prospect who “isn’t a need”.

Graham has the coveted “wrestling background” for a defensive tackle prospect, a resume filler that maybe wasn’t coveted until Aaron Donald but nonetheless has gained credibility because of that Hall of Famer who fell to 13 in the 2014 draft due to concerns about his size. Right on cue, there are rumors that Graham could fall due to arm length.

PFF’s scouting report highlights that there were basically no weaknesses in Graham’s career at Michigan as a three-down defensive tackle who can play anywhere on the line:

His PFF pass-rush grade on true pass sets, PFF run-defense grade, pass-rush win rate and solo run-stop rate over the past two years at Michigan are all above the 95th percentile. He has adequate size to play 3-technique in the NFL, but he played at just about every alignment on the defensive front over the past two years. Graham is explosive in his first step, giving him good speed-to-power conversion and effective push-pull moves. He shows good bend, and his hands are fast, violent and well placed, especially in run defense. He likes to use a two-hand swipe or a club-arm over as his main pass-rush moves. His biggest issues stem from a lack of arm length, but there is still so much to like. His competitive toughness and motor are ideal.

So far the arm length has been the only weakness that consistently shows up Graham’s scouting report (3 of the 4 weaknesses listed by PFF are related to arm length) but analysts agree that if it’s not on the tape, it shouldn’t matter. His hand-fighting experience as a wrestler helps, as do his instincts according to high school coach Kelly Talavou, coincidentally a former Seahawks practice squad player.

"Arm length doesn't matter with him because he works so hard and he's so smart," Talavou said. "He's such an instinctual player ... he sees the play coming before it happens."

Will Mike Macdonald get his guy?

Though Graham’s college career never overlapped with Macdonald’s one season as the DC, he did commit to the Wolverines in 2021 and Macdonald would have had some involvement; Michigan was still running his defense after he returned to the Ravens in 2022. Michigan’s DC last season was Wink Martindale, the same coach who was Macdonald’s boss in Baltimore as the Ravens DC from 2018-2020. Martindale cited Graham’s hands as a reason he could be one of the top DTs in the NFL right away:

"He just physically [controlled] that entire offensive line," said Wolverines defensive coordinator Wink Martindale, who coached almost two decades in the NFL before joining the Wolverines last year. "You can definitely tell his wrestling background with the way he plays because of his balance. He knows how to use his hands better than a lot of players in the league right now."

What better way for Graham’s career to continue on a skyrocketing trajectory than to have coordinator continuity from college to the pros? There would not be many — or potentially any — better fits for Graham than the Seahawks.

Seahawks 2025 draft assets:

• 1.18

• 2.50 and 2.52

• 3.82 and 3.92

• 4.137

• 5.172 and 5.175

• 7.223 and 7.234

The Seahawks haven’t traded up in the first round since picking Walter Jones in 1997, another prospect who made no sense getting outside of the top-5; Seattle sent picks 12 and 63 to Tampa Bay for pick 6 and chose Jones moments after they traded up to pick Shawn Springs at 3.

The Seahawks trade cost

If the Jaguars don’t pick Graham, the draft looks like this:

• 1.6 Raiders: Does Pete Carroll* want to talk deal with JS?

• 1.7 Jets

• 1.8 Panthers: GM Dan Morgan worked for JS

• 1.9 Saints: Could want extra assets if they plan to draft a QB

• 1.10 Bears

*John Spytek is the GM, but if the Raiders are open to trading down then surely Carroll can help navigate the terms

The 3 obvious trade-up targets are Las Vegas, Carolina, and New Orleans, with the Raiders representing Seattle’s best opportunity to claim Graham. What would those trade terms look like?

Seahawks trade picks 18, 50, 172 + Player to Raiders

Having traded Geno Smith to the Raiders, Schneider has already made a major deal with Spytek in his first year as GM. We can assume that Carroll would take other Seattle players that he likes, which in this case could be someone like Kenneth Walker or Zach Charbonnet given the probability that the Raiders just lost out on Ashton Jeanty. Another name I’d throw out there is Tariq Woolen.

According to the Trade Value Chart, pick 6 is worth 1600 points and picks 18 (900), 50 (400), and 172 (22) would equal 1322. Does Charbonnet make the difference? If that isn’t enough, then Pick 92 is worth 132 points. If a player or a third round pick isn’t moving the needle, the Seahawks would probably need to include both second round picks (780 combine points), but I don’t think that’s necessary.

Next up is the Jets: Graham has met with the Jets and I don’t know why mock drafters seem to think that New York is a non-starter there, but if he slides past 7 then trading up with Carolina makes even more sense than the Raiders.

Seahawk trade picks 18, 52, 137 to Panthers

The Panthers are still in a bind because of the Bryce Young trade as their second rounder (39th overall) belongs to the Bears and Dan Morgan (worked 8 years for Schneider) may covet some of Seattle’s day two capital in exchange for swapping first rounders. Despite going 5-12, Carolina might still be the worst team in the NFL, so Morgan should be seeking help to get more top-100 picks in this class. This could also involve a veteran player.

Seahawks trade 18, 52, 137 to Saints

The Saints are not lacking picks: They have two third and two fourth round picks, in addition to their original second. However, they need a QB worse than anyone else and yet this is NOT a QB draft. Rumors as of Thursday morning are solidly circling around Cam Ward being the only first rounder, which could put New Orleans in the best position to use their first pick on the trenches and then trade up for a quarterback with their second pick at 2.40.

If the Saints trade back to 18 and add pick 50 or 52, they could take someone like Shemar Stewart in the first and then trade up from 40 to 26 (or whatever) for a quarterback; ESPN has already spread rumors that the Saints want to get an extra first rounder. The additional capital makes it easier for New Orleans to make that gamble on a weak QB class because they could still draft the same number of day two players after the trade.

What I would do: Trade up for Mason Graham

There are few truths about fans that I know better than this one: They usually HATE the idea of trading up in the draft. But in my opinion, this scenario — and only this scenario — should be the exception.

Graham is one of the few blue chip prospects in this draft, yet the stars are aligning for him to get out of the top-5 and it’s feasible that teams picking between 6 and 9 will find that now is not the right time for them to draft Mason Graham either despite his talent. At the same time, most of those teams want to trade down for extra capital on day two AND the Seahawks have so many day two picks that they could actually stand to benefit from parting with one or two of them. But only if it’s for Graham.

So my official safe pick is Loveland, but what I would do is Graham.

Seaside Joe 2243