Operation Option: Seahawks recent first round picks must build the foundation

Byron Murphy joins Cross, Spoon, and JSN as Seahawks core-4: Seaside Joe 1888

From 2010-2012, the Seattle Seahawks made three top-15 picks in Russell Okung, Earl Thomas, and Bruce Irvin. Even if Okung was overshadowed by a fifth round classmate like Kam Chancellor or Irvin seems like the Krist Novoselic to Russell Wilson as Kurt Cobain and Bobby Wagner as Dave Grohl*, those early first round picks of the Pete Carroll/John Schneider era were needed refreshments to wash the taste of Aaron Curry out of our mouths.

Nothing against Aaron Curry or Krist Novoselic (*this feels like an unnecessary jab but let’s behonest about the Nirvana pecking order) but the Seahawks parlayed a bad 2009 season (and a great 2009 draft trade with the Broncos) to select Okung and Thomas, then a mediocre 2011 season to be back in contention by 2012 thanks to a historic first two days of drafting that year.

Then the Seahawks got too fat on their own success to sustain their draft-winning reputation through no/low-first round picks that proved an Achilles heel for Pete and John: From 2013-2021, Seattle didn’t draft a single prospect higher than 27th overall and we all know by now how those underwhelming first pick returns came to haunt the Seahawks. With four top-20 picks in the past three drafts, the time to use success as an excuse is over and Charles Cross, Devon Witherspoon, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, and Byron Murphy II need to fifth-year option-worthy for Seattle to finally get back into the race.

Patriots didn’t use same strategy in 2000s

I assumed that the Patriots must have managed to make a lot of good picks with the last few selections of the first round as they were winning the AFC East every year, but that’s not quite the case. Remember, the Seahawks didn’t pick higher than 27th in any year between 2013-2021, and they only even went to the NFC Championship in 2013 and 2014 during that period of time. Seattle was often trading to a lower spot than they were already situated. So did the Patriots just keep drafting great prospects at 29 and 32?

Nope. In fact, New England won the Super Bowl in 2001, then picked tight end Daniel Graham 21st in 2002. They missed the playoffs in 2002, then picked defensive end Ty Warren 13th in 2003. They won the Super Bowl in 2003, then picked nose tackle Vince Wilfork 21st in 2004. They won the Super Bowl in 2004, then picked guard Logan Mankins 32nd in 2005.

Including Hall of Famer Richard Seymour with the sixth pick in 2001, the Patriots picked higher than 27th overall 10 times between 2001-2012, including both Chandler Jones and Dont’a Hightower in 2012. There was also 2010, when New England drafted safety Devin McCourty 27th. The Patriots didn’t see their success as an opportunity to trade down and accumulate more picks; instead, Bill Belichick would often use his draft position as an opportunity to TRADE UP for whoever the best prospect was that fell out of the top-10 or top-15 OR he would trade players for first round picks so that he could trade DOWN for future first round picks:

In 2002, Belihcick traded from 32 to 21 for Graham.

In 2003, Belichick traded Drew Bledsoe to the Bills for pick 14, then moved up one spot for Warren. With his original selection at 19, Belichick then traded it to the Ravens (they wanted Kyle Boller) for Baltiimore’s first round pick in 2004, which New England used to pick Wilfork.

In 2005, Belichick was just very lucky that Mankins, a seven-time Pro Bowler, dropped to 32.

In 2007, Belichick traded Deion Branch to the Seahawks for their first round pick (thankfully times have changed) and they picked safety Brandon Meriweather at 24, then again traded their original pick for a first round pick the next year (from the 49ers, who wanted Joe Staley). The Patriots used the first round pick from San Francisco to pick linebacker/current head coach Jerod Mayo in 2008.

When the Patriots traded down from 23 to 26 to 41 in 2009, it proved to be a mistake: The Packers traded up for Clay Matthews, the Patriots missed out on him and instead picked Darius Butler, who had a good career but was only in New England for two seasons. Two years later, the Patriots traded Seymour to the Raiders for a first round pick that they used to select tackle Nate Solder 17th overall. Then Belichick again traded his original pick for a future first round pick.

And that’s how New England was in position to pick Chandler Jones at 21 and then trade up for Dont’a Hightower at 25 in the 2012 draft.

All of which is a detailed rundown leading up to the Patriots beating the Seahawks in the Super Bowl with five players picked in the top-25 despite New England winning their division and making a deep playoff run almost every single season between 2001 and 2013 up to that point: Mayo, Solder, Wilfork, Jones, and Hightower. In addition, the Patriots signed former 14th overall pick Darrelle Revis to a one-year contract that year.

So if you assumed (like I did) that the Patriots had a two-decade dynasty without any help from top-25 picks, you’re wrong.

The Seahawks haven’t been reliant on players with draft pedigree since 2015 other than the time they traded for Jamal Adams, really not including any of the moves that Pete and John made for first round disappointments like Barkevious Mingo or D.J. Fluker or Jadeveon Clowney. Maybe the most aggressive move to get a former first round pick who was in the best position to help the team was trading for Duane Brown, the 26th pick in 2008.

There are too many examples to count here for top-20 draft picks who were not nearly as good as advertised, Curry being the most recent example in Seattle’s case. But typically, great NFL prospects stand the best chance of becoming great NFL players. Even the 2021 Super Bowl champion Rams, a franchise that had not made any first round picks period since Jared Goff in 2016 and he wasn’t on the roster anymore, had the following players on the roster: Matthew Stafford (former 1st overall), Von Miller (2nd), Jalen Ramsey (5th), Leonard Floyd (9th), Odell Beckham (12th), and Aaron Donald (13th). That’s a lot of top-15 picks for a team that rarely picked in the top-50.

Seahawks core-4

The Seahawks now have a core of players picked in the top-20 who carry the responsibility to give Seattle a Super Bowl-caliber nucleus by 2026, and that should be something that the four players want to have rather than to run away from it or say, “It’s not all on me”. That’s usually why players are picked in the top-20. It wouldn’t surprise me if Witherspoon had a tattoo that said, “Put it all on me.”

Charles Cross didn’t have the best year two in the NFL and dealt with a turf toe injury, but I’d be surprised if he doesn’t get the fifth-year option. The Seahawks actually gave Noah Fant the fifth-year option recently so it’s not like they have a streak going, technically, but none of Seattle’s own first round picks have been worthy of the option: The Seahawks declined options on Jordyn Brooks, Rashaad Penny, Bruce Irvin, Germain Ifedi, L.J. Collier, and James Carpenter.

Irvin is the only one of those players picked earlier than 25th and also maybe the one guy who made Seattle think about it a little bit.

Cross should get the fifth-year option exercised in 2025 unless he just has a really bad year or a really bad injury. If Cross is deemed something like the 20th-best left tackle in the NFL, I would expect Schneider to still use the fifth-year option on him. He’ll only be 24 when the 2025 season starts and “good enough” left tackles are almost as hard to find as “really good” left tackles.

We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves on Witherspoon and JSN, but nothing about Spoon’s rookie season suggests anything other than being a franchise cornerstone. With a year under his belt at 21 and a new offensive coordinator calling the plays, we'll just have to wait and see what sort of trajectory Smith-Njigba appears to be on at the end of the 2024 season. But as one of the highest-drafted receivers in Seahawks history, JSN is giving me more hope than even Tyler Lockett or Golden Tate after they had career starts not quite as impactful as Njigba’s.

And Murphy is what he is: A player who has been in the league for one week and not even signed his first NFL contract. But defensive prospects of Murphy’s caliber haven’t been drafted by the Seahawks at all since Irvin in 2012 or Curry in 2009. Which I know doesn’t sound thrilling but that’s not usually how it goes and we’re not going to say, “Well because this ONE example exists, the next player must be like that.”

No. If the Seahawks had made eight top-20 picks in a decade instead of zero or one, the odds increase dramatically for finding the gems: The top defensive prospect drafted by Seattle before Curry was Marcus Trufant in 2003, and in the 90s included Shawn Springs, Sam Adams, and Cortez Kennedy.

For every top-10 pick gut punch like Rick Mirer, there’s a Walter Jones at the “WOW” end and Joey Galloway at the “Okay, that’s nice!” side.

The Seattle Seahawks absolutely had to start drafting players who fall between “That’s nice!” and “WOW” and thanks to Russell Wilson’s former Denver Broncos, the team didn’t even have to be among the worst to get Cross and Witherspoon into the mix.

Only time will tell how these draft decision will pay off, but the last three first rounds sure do FEEL a lot better than the previous nine.

Byron Murphy II’s draft day (in full)

I’m going to drop a few Seaside Streams today as a bonus. I’ve never seen anything like this before: Byron Murphy released an entire movie-length VLOG of his experience of draft day.

I know some players have YouTube channels, but 85 minutes is something else. Murphy just started the channel and has one other video.

Christian Haynes=Nate Davis?

Brian Baldinger didn’t put Haynes in his top-5 iOL rankings before the draft, but wanted to give him a shout out because he thinks he has the perfect comp for him: Nate Davis.

Davis was a third round pick of the Titans in 2019, struggled early in his career, but settled in enough to get a big free agent deal with the Bears in 2023. Maybe Haynes won’t be handed the right guard job out of camp if he needs to get better against bigger defensive players, but could just need time to work on honing his strengths as a powerful run blocker.

Brett Kollmann on Seahawks Forever

Good interview get here by Dan Viens.

Seahawks trade up for Cortez Kennedy

Here’s the 1990 NFL Draft first round on YouTube, with Seattle trading up to pick three to get Cortez Kennedy. Before then, Mel Kiper notes that he had a second round grade on Jeff George, the quarterback who went first overall.

The Seahawks also released this new draft video (series?) called Before the Noise, I’m not sure yet what to think of it. I didn’t feel like I necessarily learned that much more about what happened behind the scenes.