Seahawks Practice Squad Projection: Ideal Candidates
An early look at who could make the final 14-man practice squad in Seattle: 5/15/2023
On Saturday, Seaside Joe posted an early 53-man roster projection for the Seattle Seahawks and one of the commenters requested a preview of the practice squad as well. Though it is early for a 53-man roster, let alone a practice squad, I begged Seaside Joe for his thoughts on the matter and remarkably he acquiesced.
Probably just so he could use the term acquiesce in a sentence.
Over the past 14 years of covering the NFL, two surprisingly popular posts every year are “undrafted free agent tracker” and “practice squad tracker” news. I think that the UDFA tracker gets more views than any single draft pick announcement and the practice squad updates get more views than any 53-man roster announcement.
Why is that?
Maybe it’s simple math: People constantly refresh trackers in order to see if there have been any updates.
But maybe it has more to do with getting to read about any players on the team and a practice squad or undrafted free agent signing—of which the Seahawks had 25 this year—is a lot more names that one or two. Even a final roster, there are probably at least 50 names that won’t surprise you.
Practice a practice squad could be 14 names that surprise you! Some of them weren’t even on the roster for the entire year until that day.
When you look at 2022’s initial practice squad, names like Sean Mannion, who was on Seattle’s roster a year before and not last training camp, serve as examples of big surprises. While names like Vi Jones, Greg Eiland, Jalen McKenzie, Cade Johnson, and Tyler Mabry are still fighting for their NFL lives with the Seahawks this offseason.
Most of Seattle’s intial 2022 practice squad was in training camp last year and that included one draft pick (Bo Melton), a couple of notable veterans (J.J. Arcega-Whiteside, Tanner Muse), and only a handful of their UDFA rookies (Jones, Scott Nelson, and Josh Onujiogu).
How will the Seahawks initial 2023 practice squad look? Well, one thing is for sure: They have a lot more undrafted free agents to consider and more competitions for them to be involved with this year. I won’t be 100-percent accurate, but I do believe these are the names that I’d rate with the highest odds to make the Seahawks roster this year…just maybe not their final 53-man roster.