Cover photo taken from DraftKings.
Welcome to 32 Teams in 32 Days, a daily series leading up to kickoff of the 2025 NFL season where I preview every team in the league as decided by a wheel spin and project what their season will look like.
The squad with the distinct honor of captaining our maiden voyage is the Seattle Seahawks, a team that I once had quite a disdain for, but have grown to respect quite a lot.
That being said, not everything going on in the PNW is making a lot of sense these days.
Seattle was the only 10-plus win team to not make the playoffs in 2024, missing out by a hair courtesy of some wonky tiebreakers in the NFC. The Seahawks were simply so-so on both sides of the ball with EPA/play on offense of -0.013 and -0.018 on defense, clocking in at 20th and 10th in the league, respectively. Losing a couple of very winnable games — namely against the Giants and Vikings — didn’t help either. Still, it felt like a success of a first season under new head coach Mike Macdonald, and one that could be built upon.
But, the big story of the offseason was a recalibration — there’s a word former Seahawks DC Dan Quinn would be proud of — of the offense, spearheaded by trades that sent away QB Geno Smith and WR DK Metcalf to the Raiders and Steelers, respectively. Those two were the anchors of that side of the ball ever since Smith got there in 2022, connecting for 3,380 yards and 24 touchdowns. I’ve always considered Geno wildly underrated and DK rather overrated, but regardless of subjective perception, there’s no denying that the decision to simultaneously move off both was a little puzzling.
The puzzle got slightly harder to decipher when the Seahawks decided to replace Smith with Sam Darnold, giving the former first-round pick a three-year, $100.5 million contract after a career-rejuvenating season in Minnesota that ended with a whimper. To me, that’s a downgrade. I do like Darnold, but one good season that ended with two of the worst games you’ll see in big moments wouldn’t convince me to move off a consistent guy like Geno, even after a 15-interception campaign. Darnold had an incrementally higher EPA+CPOE at 0.121 compared to Smith’s 0.110, which says more about Geno considering that Seattle’s offensive line was 21st in pass block win rate last year. For reference, Minnesota was 2nd. And, of course, the Vikings have arguably the best receiver in football in Justin Jefferson and an upper echelon WR2 in Jordan Addison.
To that end, the Seahawks do still have a solid group of weapons for Darnold to play with, even with the departure of Metcalf — which isn’t as impactful as it seems. DK worked with Geno because of each of their affinities for the deep ball. With Darnold, things will be more short and intermediate with the ball coming out quickly and decisively. That plays right into the hands of third-year WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba — who is poised for one of the league’s biggest breakouts in 2025 — and newcomer Cooper Kupp who returns home to Washington looking for a new spark. Jake Bobo and Marquez Valdes-Scantling don’t round out the world’s greatest WR room, but Kenneth Walker III and Zach Charbonnet make up for that out of the backfield. Plus, second-round rookie TE Elijah Arroyo could prove to be another solid safety blanket.
Unfortunately for that side of the ball, the offensive line still figures to be a weakness. The Seahawks spent a first round pick on standout NDSU lineman Gray Zabel to bolster the interior, but the rest of that group still has many questions to answer. Is Charles Cross capable of being a franchise LT? Is Olu Oluwatimi able to live up to his potential? Will the right side be able to stop a gentle breeze from sneaking through? There are just too many questions.
Fortunately for Seattle, the defense shouldn’t have too many questions to answer. At least no new ones. Again, it was a very middle-of-the-pack lineup across the board, but nothing was as offensively bad as the OL (see what I did there?). Leonard Williams found new life off the edge and Demarcus Lawrence will look to do the same, Byron Murphy II has all the potential in the world to be a top-tier tackle and if healthy, Uchenna Nwosu can make a real impact on and off the ball. Losing Dre’Mont Jones hurts, and I wish there was more of an effort to improve the pass rush, but that effort seemed to go to the secondary instead, drafting athletic freak Nick Emmanwori to bolster a unit that was already pretty solid. Devon Witherspoon is an absolute stud on the boundary, Coby Bryant can play at a high level and Julian Love has been consistent. If Riq Woolen can find his old self, this defense can easily find themselves in the top-10 in passing.
Overall, Seattle might not have done enough to make a true jump from year one to year two under a new regime. If anything, this will be the transition year for the Seahawks when we all thought 2024 was. If that’s the case, then this season could go any which way.
X-Factor: QB Sam Darnold
The Seahawks go as Sam Darnold goes. That probably goes without saying. My big question remains: how does he bounce back from the putrid ending to the 2024 season which saw him lose tens of millions? Because while it might seem like Seattle is trusting him to take over for the next few years, that might not be the case. He could be dropped at the first sign of trouble in favor of rookie QB Jalen Milroe, who was selected in the third round out of Alabama. You’ve got to figure that the Seahawks see more of a future in the athletic monster Milroe, perhaps hoping to shape him into their own version of Jalen Hurts. I’m a fan of his, and I can see a path to him starting late in 2025 — maybe after Seattle is knocked out of playoff contention — and even to begin 2026. Darnold needs to play at the level he was at for the majority of last year with the Vikings and not have the falloff. That’s easier said than done. Jefferson and Addison aren’t here; neither is TJ Hockenson or that offensive line or even that defense. Kevin O’Connell isn’t in his ear anymore. This is more of a prove-it situation than it seems for Sam. Will he fold under the pressure again or find away to make it work?
Team MVP: WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba
You thought I was going to go this whole time only talking about JSN one brief time? Negative. The breakout was inevitable last year — 100 catches for 1,130 yards and six TD as an alleged WR2 in year two was something to behold. Now, Smith-Njigba is the clear-cut top option in an offensive scheme which will benefit him much more than last year’s. I can easily see JSN being a 115-plus catch receiver with over 1,200 yards and 10 touchdowns. He’ll get 10-to-15 targets a game, many of which coming in the quick game, but he can still take the top off the defense for the big play — especially more than any other receiver on the roster. I think he figures to be a consensus top-10 WR in football in six months. And I get to say “I told you so.”
Breakout Candidate: S Nick Emmanwori
You could see what the vision was when Seattle drafted Emmanwori out of South Carolina in the second round. With Woolen, Witherspoon and Bryant, they’ve been trying to rebuild the Legion of Boom. Now, the hope is that Emmanwori can be their Kam Chancellor. No one has ever tested like him, clocking in with the greatest RAS score for a safety in the history of the Scouting Combine, but his lack of polish outside of athleticism caused his slip into the mid-second round. But, if there’s anyone who can mold him into a truly elite safety, it should be Mike Macdonald. I have high hopes for the kid in this system, and I hope it works out. Because we could all use another Kam Chancellor in our lives.
Record Prediction: 9-8
The schedule ain’t hard, but it ain’t easy either. The NFC West is challenging enough as is, especially with the 49ers looking to get back on track and the Cardinals being sneakily improved. Playing the AFC South helps for what should be three free wins, and Houston has to go up to Seattle in the middle of the year. The NFC South also isn’t too difficult, but who knows what Carolina and Atlanta could be? The point remains: this Seahawks team doesn’t show enough improvement — if any at all — to inspire the confidence that they’ll make a jump into the postseason. Nine wins honestly might be generous here. It all comes down to the man under center. And that’s far too big of a question mark.
Next up: 
Arizona Cardinals
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