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The original was posted on /r/nfl by /u/The_Throwback_King on 2026-03-22 03:17:43+00:00.
Intro: What Makes a Great Team
Every great team is built upon the hard work of a number of talented people, all dedicated towards the same goal: Winning the Super Bowl.
The Legion of Boom-era Seahawks were built upon an insanely fruitful three-year-run of draft selections, from 2010 to 2012. Each of those three classes were loaded with talent from Round 1 to Round 7, even down to the undrafted free agents. This good fortune immediately thrust Seattle back into contention, even as the waning years of Holmgren-era fell to the one-year-era Mora “error”
The success of those early 2010s teams really put the Seahawks franchise on the map, in a way they never truly were before. They got to those lofty highs by drafting well, however such luck proved finite and almost instantly after the legendary 2012 Draft Class had debuted, the team’s drafting cratered.
Of the 70 Players Seattle selected over the next 9 drafts, between 2013 and 2021, they managed to select 4 Pro Bowl Players. Just 4. (Five if you include the three Pro Bowls Frank Clark made with the Chiefs). Those 4 were:
WR Tyler Lockett - 2015 3rd Rounder - 1x Pro Bowl (2015) - A talented return man who rapidly became a clutch and perennially underrated weapon for the better part of 10 seasons. Lockett ended his Seahawk tenure as 2nd-Best WR in Franchise History in most statistical categories.
CB Shaquill Griffin - 2017 3rd Rounder - 1x Pro Bowl (2019) - A decent starting cornerback for a few years. However, he only made the Pro Bowl as an alternate after Marshon Lattimore, Richard Sherman, and Jalen Ramsey either opted out or were ineligible to play
P Michael Dickson - 2018 5th Rounder - 1x Pro Bowl (2018) - Came out the gate as a stud punter, still a stud punter in 2025. Should have more Pro Bowls than he has. An absolute ace every time he’s called upon.
WR DK Metcalf - 2019 2nd Rounder - 2x Pro Bowls (2020, 2023) - THE Physical Phenom. The Wide Receiver who helped Russell Wilson wreak havoc during his later prime, who…frustratingly never made the jump to absolute superstar like we all hoped’
As special as those players were, 4 Pro Bowlers over 9 years is simply not the way to assemble a competitive roster, no matter how you slice it. It was an especially disappointing result for a GM coming off such a hot run as Schneider.
Entering the 2022 Offseason, many were wondering if John Schneider still had his stuff. Was this STILL the same mind who built the early 2010s Seahawks into a juggernaut?..
Well…four years later, in a division shared with two of the best front offices in the game, You gotta be realistic. You simply have to face the facts…
…He did it again. The madman built another defensive juggernaut AGAIN. The roster has been completely reset from 2013. And we’re back to basking in the sweet sensation of Super Bowl glory once again
A Super Bowl spent getting our lick back at the ONE team that simultaneously splintered the last great Seahawks team and broke the hearts of Seahawks fans, young and old.
John Schneider take a bow, you’ve earned it. That’s your magnum opus right there.
While Schneider certainly cemented his legacy as one of the best GMs in football, there is so much more to the journey of the 2025 Seahawks, so many more great stories to celebrate, and individuals worthy of recognition, and it all started a little over a year ago during the previous year’s offseason.
The 2025 Offseason
The time immediately following the 2024 season was…interesting, to say the least. There was certainly a lot to be happy about.
New head coach Mike Macdonald stepped into the massive shoes of Pete Carroll as good as any fan could realistically hope for. The team continued their recent trend of being a bubble playoff team, as they had for most of the decade. And the team on a whole felt like it was sailing with a good solid vision for the first time in years.
But, it also wasn’t a home run year either.
The O-Line was STILL a problem, as it had been for most of the past 15 seasons. Geno Smith had regressed again, and proved incredibly turnover prone The run game was frustratingly inefficient.
Seattle’s new offensive coordinator, Ryan Grubb and special teams coordinator, Jay Harbaugh looked completely outmatched.
Multiple free agency moves blew up in their face, which led to a bunch of issues all throughout the season.
But the most persistent issue with the 2024 team: they just couldn’t get consistent. They limped out of the gate to a 4-5 start, rattled off 4 wins to bring them back in the playoff hunt. Only to be absolutely punished by the Packers and Vikings, which sent our playoff hopes down the drain (despite two late wins, purely for pride).
It was a winning season, but it didn’t really FEEL like one.
It was clear that the 2024 Season was for the Rams’ glory. They were a young team, fresh off of a quick rebuild of their own, and had surged back into assured playoff form. They toppled the Vikings in the Wild Card, giving the fans something to rally around in the wake of the devastating Palisades Fire, before giving the eventual Super Bowl-winning Eagles their toughest challenge in the Divisional
For the Seahawks, there were plenty of wins in 2024, but also plenty of question marks. Mainly, what would the team do to fix all of the holes in their roster? And how could they start to properly compete? Not just with their division of perennial contenders but with the big dogs of the league in general
There were simply a lot of unknowns there and people didn’t know what to think about the Seahawks entering the 2025 season. Many thought that it’d be a multi-year process, and many fans were cool with that. Patience is an all-important virtue. The team felt like they had a vision. It felt like we were heading in a positive direction, and some were content to have faith in the long term vision of what the team could become
Mike Macdonald, though, knew what the team could become in the short term. He might be a sophomore coach coming off a winning first year, but he still had big moves to make, and waiting wasn’t an option
Coaching Changes
Unlike other coaches in the 2024 coaching cycle, Macdonald didn’t have the luxury of time on his side. To be frank, his staff-building was a rush job.
Aden Durde, the team’s defensive coordinator had immediately proved his worth. While Mike was still in charge of calling the defense, Durde quickly made his mark in the locker room, becoming a very welcome presence behind the scenes.
Jay Harbaugh, struggled as a first time Special Teams coordinator. But he was still in the team’s good graces and, like Durde, was retained for 2025
The same couldn’t be said for Seattle’s OC. I was always a big Ryan Grubb fan. The guy who came up with Kalen DeBoer and helped bring the UW Huskies back to Natty contention? The guy who turned Michael Penix, Rome Odunze, Jalen McMillan into productive NFL players (and Ja’Lynn Polk into…a NFL player). The guy who stuck by Seattle, despite his boss stabbing the school and city in the back to surf the Crimson Tide?
Now he was going from Seattle’s collegiate team to their pro team? It was the stuff of storybooks…
…at least, that was the hope.
Unfortunately, he was an AWFUL fit. A first-time NFL coach at any level, going from a star-studded collegiate offense to one with an erratic starting QB, a dysfunctional, discordant O-line, and two running backs who struggled to find balance.
He simply wasn’t built to handle such a learning curve AND such an adverse rookie season. It especially showed in the conflicting visions. Both John Schneider and Mike Macdonald fancied themselves a good run-first offense and Grubb could not scheme one to save his life. 2024 had some of the most inefficient, ineffectual, and frustrating run plays I’ve ever seen.
The writing was simply on the wall, the Grubb experiment was a failure. His firing after one year was both a mercy, and a necessity.
To replace him, Seattle selected Klint Kubiak, a man with a safe, high floor, with tried and true scheme, and NFL lineage. His last stop as OC for New Orleans, featured some high flying offenses, before a myriad of injuries derailed matters in The Big Easy
With the staff lightly re-shuffled, the team looked to enter…
Free Agency
Departures
| Player | Position | Seahawks Tenure | New Team | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tyler Lockett | WR | 2015-2024 | Tennessee Titans | 1 Yr, $4M ($3.49M GTD) |
| DK Metcalf | WR | 2019-2024 | Pittsburgh Steelers | Traded for 2nd and Pick Swap |
| Geno Smith | QB | 2019-2024 | Las Vegas Raiders | Traded for 3rd |
| Stone Forsythe | OT | 2021-2024 | New York Giants | 1 Yr, $1.34M ($140K GTD) |
| Noah Fant | TE | 2022-2024 | Cincinnati Bengals | 1 Yr, $2.75M ($1M GTD) |
| Artie Burns | CB | 2022-2024 | Miami Dolphins | 1 Yr, $1.36M |
| Dre’Mont Jones | ED | 2023-2024 | Tennessee Titans | 1 Yr, $8.5M ($7.99M GTD) |
| Laken Tomlinson | OG | 2024 | Houston Texans | 1 Yr, $4.25M ($2.5M GTD) |
| Rayshawn Jenkins | S | 2024 | Cleveland Browns | 1 Yr, $1.42M ($1.17M GTD) |
| Roy Robertson-Harris | iDL | 2024 | New York Giants | 2 Yr, $9M ($5.3M GTD) |
| George Fant | OT | 2016-2019, 2024 | Washington Commanders | 1 Yr, $1.26M |
Tyler Lockett - It’s always bitter when you have to say farewell to one of your franchise icons. Tyler Lockett, coming out of K-State, pro…
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