Uchenna Nwosu Injury Update You Didn't Want To Hear

Can Seahawks find acceptable replacement for Uchenna Nwosu?

Can the Seahawks find an acceptable replacement for Uchenna Nwosu at midseason? As hard as that is to believe, every team in the NFL is going through something significant or will go through something significant as it relates to injury. If a team could be prepared to lose their most experienced edge rusher midseason, it is potentially the team that has drafted three second round outside linebackers in four years.

After Pete Carroll said on Monday that Nwosu likely needs season-ending pectoral surgery, the Seahawks must now assess all options with eight days to go before the 2023 trade deadline. Nwosu had played in 70% of Seattle’s defensive snaps this season prior to his injury against the Cardinals, down slightly from his 78% mark in 2022.

Pete has boosted the playing time for Boye Mafe (37% to 62%) and he is now the Seahawks best edge rusher, having notched a sack in four straight games. Mafe has seven pressures in five games, up significantly from his eight pressures in 17 games as a rookie.

Darrell Taylor has been in and out of the doghouse throughout his career, mostly because he lacks the discipline to set the edge and is too inconsistent (Taylor did notch 1.5 sacks against Arizona, his first of the season), but now he’ll be motivated by a contract year to take advantage of Seattle’s probable desperation to find a Nwosu replacement.

Nwosu played in between 40-65 snaps in all 18 games last season, including playoffs.

Taylor has played in more than 40 snaps just 7 times over 2.5 healthy seasons. His career high is 54 snaps, a mark that Nwosu met or eclipsed 10 times just last season alone.

For the reasons above, it’s hard for me to imagine that Darrell Taylor is adequately prepared to go from a 30-snap to a 55-snap player overnight. If that was the case, would the Seahawks have paid Nwosu so much money to begin with?

The Seahawks have one other outside linebacker on the 53-man roster, rookie second round pick Derick Hall. Of Hall, Pete says that he’s on track to be the next Mafe, which is encouraging for 2024 but not comforting as it relates to 2023. Carroll isn’t like, “Yeah, he can do what Mafe can do.”

No, Pete thinks that Hall is on the same track as Mafe, meaning that his rookie season is going to be full of bumps on the road: Mafe was given increased playing time in 2022 and the team had to start pulling him back because he was in over his head.

The team will have to give Hall more playing time now (his 32% playing time is around the place Mafe was last season) but all signs point towards the Seahawks needing to make another addition to the 53-man roster. A significant one.

For more on Derick Hall and the best young players on the Seahawks, read Monday’s article about the 99 and Later Club.

We know that Nwosu will go on injured reserve, opening a place on the roster to add an edge rusher, and there are two on the practice squad: preseason standout Levi Bell and 2022 fifth round pick Tyreke Smith. Fans will probably want Bell over Smith…does it really matter?

Either option would be added as depth, soaking up maybe 10-15 snaps when Seattle is digging deep into the reserves. That’s about the Devin Bush line: The former top-10 pick has played in 57 snaps over six games and I doubt anyone has really noticed.

Two weeks ago, I wrote about potential trade deadline buyer options if the Seahawks had the inclination to get involved. Now that Nwosu is out for the season, they has to be a more serious consideration.

One name on it, Frank Clark, was released by the Denver Broncos not longer after my post. Rumors have it that he’ll return to the Kansas City Chiefs after going in for a visit, but nothing has developed there yet and now Seattle could be mentioned as a team of need that also knows Clark.

“My ears are burning…”

No, not that Clark.

There will be talk of Brian Burns probably, but I wouldn’t encourage the Seahawks to spend a first round pick on Nwosu’s replacement. The Panthers reportedly turned down two first round picks for Burns at last year’s deadline, an offer not expected to come back to Carolina ever again, so the minimum is likely to be at least one first round pick and more. That, in addition to the money Burns wants on his next contract, makes him unattractive to most teams.

Instead, I’d ask the Panthers about Yetur Gross-Matos. A lot of players are being traded for these day three pick swaps, so could 0-6 Carolina be open to trading Gross-Matos, a second round pick in 2020 who hasn’t lived up to the hype, for an exchange of a sixth for a fifth?

Gross-Matos is 25, he hasn’t missed any games in the last two years, and he hasn’t missed any tackles (according to Pro-Football-Reference) since his rookie campaign. That’s 120 career tackles and only one missed tackle.

I would also be talking to the Green Bay Packers, a team that is now 2-4 and rich in few areas but one thing they do have a lot of is outside linebackers. What about Preston Smith? The veteran outside linebacker won’t cost the Seahawks anything and they can release him next year with no commitment left over.

The Titans have already traded safety Kevin Byard this week. I would not take Harold Landry because he has a fully guaranteed $17.5 million salary in 2024, but what about Arden Key? Key is the same age as Landry and has probably been about as good this season. Like Gross-Matos, I don’t see him costing much in trade capital, maybe a day three pick.

The Seahawks have options and while they won’t be as good as Uchenna Nwosu, that can’t be expected at this point of the season, at least the news happened before the trade deadline and with months left in the year to figure out who will be best suited for those snaps. Every team has to go through times like this and in the words of Clark, “These are the moments when we find out which of those teams have that dog in them.”