The Seattle Seahawks have one of the weaker rosters in the NFC going into the 2022 season. That said, this group does have its strong points. Even though they took a major step backwards at the game’s most important position, this group remains loaded at a few other spots.
At the top of the list has to be wide receiver, where this franchise is about as blessed as any in the league. According to Pro Football Focus, it is the Seahawks’ biggest strength this year.
“Seattle’s roster is not in good shape, but D.K. Metcalf and Tyler Lockett remain one of the best receiver duos in the league, and there are some intriguing players behind them in Dee Eskridge and Bo Melton. Throwing the ball Lockett’s way has resulted in a passer rating of 124.8 in his NFL career, while Metcalf is one of the game’s most devastating weapons against man coverage.”
The Seahawks also have a few other rare athletes that PFF didn’t metion, including rookie Dareke Yong – whose relative athletic score is a near-perfect 9.93. There’s also multiple quality depth options like Cody Thompson, who wide receivers coach Sanjay Lal says had the best spring of this bunch. Add it all up and there may only be a handful of NFL teams who have a deeper group of pass-catchers than this one.
PFF got vague when it came to naming Seattle’s biggest weakness. They could have gone with the simple and correct answer, which is quarterback. Instead, they chose “everything else.”
“When you take Russell Wilson off the Seahawks roster, you realize just how bad the situation had become and what the team required of him to drag them to the playoffs every season. The departure of Bobby Wagner removes yet another quality player from the group, leaving Seattle with one of the worst rosters in the league and one of the worst quarterback situations to go along with it.”
Wilson was carrying this team the last few years and nobody but a homer would call this a strong roster overall. However, it’s not fair to call the whole team bad because they lost Wilson and Bobby Wagner. Remember, most of last year’s key pieces have returned outside of those two plus left tackle Duane Brown and cornerback D.J. Reed.
In addition to wide receiver, this roster remains loaded at safety, running back and defensive tackle. They also have some promising young cornerbacks and a perfectly decent starting pair of linebackers, who PFF ranked No. 8 in the NFL.
That said, in general PFF seems to be more down on these Seahawks than most analysts. Not too long ago they put them dead-last in their power rankings. A more recent league-wide ranking that included input from ESPN had them moving up to No. 29.
Either way, that’s too low for a team with this much talent. While it’s hard to see this team making the playoffs, they’re not bad enough to be in line for a top-five overall pick in next year’s draft.
