SEASON PREDICTION 

Seattle is coming off the greatest high in football, so anything sort of a Super Bowl win will be a letdown from 2025. I want to start by saying I don't expect Seattle to repeat this year, but I do expect them to be competitive. There were a lot off offseason losses this free agency cycle which is to be expected after winning a super bowl. The champs usually have the best players and the best demand money which Seattle unfortunately did not have enough of to dish out to everyone. Outside of all the valuable players they lost, Klint Kubiak, arguably the main reason behind the Seattle Super Bowl run, has departed for Las Vegas. They got Fleury to replace him, but I'm not so sure how great of an OC he will be considering his coaching career mainly deals with the defensive side of the ball, and Kubiak's production was already at an elite level.  

Despite my concerns for Fleury, he will be blessed to structure his offense around the OPOY and Ohio State great Jaxson Smith Njigba. There is nothing left to say about the Emerald City Route Artist that hasn't been said already. He shattered any concern people had about his ability to step up in a WR room without Metcalf, and Locket by leading the NFL in receiving yards and being the focal point of a Super Bowl winning offense. My only issue with the WR room this upcoming year is how top heavy and reliant they seem to be on JSN. There is no doubt that JSN will face zone, shell, and double team coverage consistently throughout the season, and the only other viable receiving threat that Seattle has is Shaheed who is more of a special team weapon than a true WR. Furthermore, the run game is facing a severe downgrade with the loss of K9 to free agency, and Charbonnet expected to miss time as he recovers from an injury. Seattle will be putting all their eggs in the Jadarian Price basket as they hope he can slide in as a rookie and contribute immediately. While Price has the talent, he was a backup on his college team and has yet to show he can handle a full college workload let alone an NFL workload. My prediction is that the run game will be a bit below average as the duo of Price and Wilson work in tandem until Charbonnet can get healthy. Regarding Sam Darnold I feel that he will have a similar season to 2025. I anticipate some explosive deep throw TD's to JSN and Shaheed but also some frustrating turnovers. Something that gets lost in the fold due to Seattle winning the Super Bowl is that Darnold was not great at protecting the ball in the regular season fishing with an alarmingly high 20 turnovers. If this problem continues into 2026, it could cost Seattle some games due to their margin of error being much smaller than 2025 where they could rely on their elite defense.  

Speaking of that elite defense, Mike Macdonald seems eager to repeat what he did in 2025 and attempt to lead a ferocious unit on his way to back-to-back Super Bowl wins. Even though Macdonald is a wizard on the defensive end, I do expect some regression from Seattle. They lost so many key pieces in this free agency cycle with the likes of Boye Mafe, Riq Wollen, and Coby Bryant (not the basketball one). However, they still have elite players lined up across the board including Leonard Williams, Byron Murphy, Devon Witherspoon, and their standout rookie from 2025 Nick Emmanwori. Witherspoon was recently signed a new deal which is massive for the Seattle secondary and gives them a rock-solid piece to build around for the future. There isn't much that needs to change schematically for the Seahawks either. They won the Super Bowl running what they do now so as they saying goes “if it ain’t broke don't fix it”. With Macdonald leading the charge, the unit is primed for another top 10 season. If their replacements and new rookie additions can exceed expectations, then they might be able to reach the level of the 2025 squad but at the current moment I don't see them reaching that level.  

Overall, I expect a bit of a Super Bowl hangover from Seattle due to all the losses they suffered in free agency. The offense is expected to take a step back this season with the departure of Kubiak and K9. The defense while still elite doesn't seem to be at the level of 2025 where they could single handedly win a game by themselves while Darnold committed 4 turnovers in a single outing. Thus, with all things considered I have Seattle finishing with a respectable 11-6 record slotting them in 2nd place for the NFC West.