NFL players don’t vote on these AP awards, but they are about to find out what happens when a competitor like Seahawks cornerback Devon Witherspoon gets underestimated.
Last night was the league’s annual Honors showcase, where awards were handed out to a variety of players. One race to watch for the Seahawks was Defensive Rookie of the Year, where Witherspoon was one of five finalists. We had presumed that Jalen Carter would win, but in the end it was Will Anderson who took the hardware home. Here’s how the voting broke down.
AP Defensive Rookie of the Year
Will Anderson 16-21-8 = 151
Jalen Carter 14-14-10 = 122
Kobie Turner 14-6-7 = 95
Devon Witherspoon 4-7-16 = 57
Joey Porter Jr. 1-0-1 = 6
YaYa Diaby 1-0-1 = 6
Brian Branch 0-0-6 = 6
Jack Campbell 0-1-0 = 3
Byron Young…— Rob Maaddi (@RobMaaddi) February 9, 2024
You may have noticed something strange in there. Not only did Spoon not win, he didn’t even finish among the top three – receiving less than half the total votes Carter got and nearly one-third of Anderson’s.
That means clearly some folks have not gotten the message yet.
After the news broke, Seattle’s angry little goblin in the slot shared a perfect response on Twitter.
😈
— Devon Witherspoon (@DevonWitherspo1) February 9, 2024
The greatest athlete of all time thrived on slights like these, either real or imagined. Seeing Spoon respond this way makes us believe he has a similar drive and it’s exactly the kind of thing you want to see as a Seahawks fan.
This new motivation, combined with a natural second-year development and the added influence of defensive mastermind head coach Mike Macdonald may be enough to catapault Spoon into the Defensive Player of the Year race as soon as the 2024 season.
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