Seattle Seahawks

Seattle's defense bled minus 124.5 expected points added on the season — second-stingiest unit in football, and the engine of this entire story. Here's how a top-two defense carried this team, how Sam Darnold quietly authored a top-five efficiency season, and the one ground-game number that says this offense had to win a very specific way. Fourteen and three. NFC West champs, number one seed, and they didn't just win the conference — they won the Super Bowl, beating New England twenty-nine to thirteen. The Seahawks smashed.

Let's set the table. Seattle finished plus 32.7 in offensive expected points added, a thirteenth-ranked, slightly-above-average offense. The defense was the headliner at minus 124.5 expected points added allowed — second in football. Twenty-seven takeaways ranked eighth, forty-seven sacks ranked eighth, and a forty-three percent third-down conversion rate ranked seventh. Steady floor, not boom-or-bust: outside of three close losses — the early stumble to San Francisco, the thirty-eight to thirty-five shootout against Tampa, and a two-point game at the Rams in Week Eleven — they were never out of a game. They closed the regular season on an eight-game winning streak, then steamrolled the playoffs by a combined one hundred and one to forty-six.

Now let's talk about the passing offense — the side of the ball that actually drove the points. Sam Darnold produced plus 56.6 expected points added on five hundred and ten dropbacks, plus 0.11 per attempt, top-ten in the league. His adjusted net yards per attempt of 7.4 ranked fourth among qualified starters, and his completion percentage came in four point three percent above expectation — also top-five, meaning he was hitting throws the tracking data flagged as harder than average. Jaxon Smith-Njigba was the engine: one hundred and nineteen catches, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-three yards, ten touchdowns, thirty-seven percent target share. The defining snap came in Week Twelve at Tennessee — third and six, tie game, second quarter — Darnold ripped a deep ball down the right sideline to Smith-Njigba for a sixty-three yard touchdown. Single most valuable offensive play of their season at plus 6.4 expected points added. Pass protection held up too, a five point two percent sack rate in the seventy-fifth percentile leaguewide. The passing game smashed.

Now let's dig into the rushing offense, because this is where the story gets uglier. Seattle ran five hundred and eight times for two thousand and ninety-eight yards — four point one a carry, one hundred and twenty-three a game, both middle-of-the-pack. The problem is efficiency. Rushing expected points added came in at minus 36.8, twenty-ninth in the league, thirteenth percentile. They ran a lot, they got yards, and on a per-play basis the run game was actively hurting them at minus 0.07 per carry. Kenneth Walker carried two hundred and twenty-one times for one thousand twenty-seven yards and five scores, while Zach Charbonnet took the goal-line work with twelve rushing touchdowns — seventh in the entire league. So the run game's value wasn't between the twenties. It was inside the five. Seattle won fourteen games despite the ground game, not because of it.

Next up, the pass defense — and this is where Seattle truly separated. Two hundred and thirteen passing yards a game, just twenty passing touchdowns all year, passing expected points added allowed of minus 64.8, eighty-first percentile leaguewide. The rush got home forty-seven times, delivered one hundred and ten quarterback hits, and held opponents to a thirty-two percent third-down conversion rate — a top-of-the-league stop rate. And they took the ball away in clusters: twenty-seven takeaways, eighteen interceptions. The signature snap came in Week Thirteen against Minnesota — fourth and one at Seattle's own four-yard line, Vikings driving for a go-ahead score, and Ernest Jones jumped a short route and took it eighty-five yards the other way for a pick-six. Worth minus 10.7 expected points to Minnesota on one snap. That was this defense — not just stout, but capable of ending drives by sprinting the other direction. The secondary smashed.

And the run defense was somehow even more dominant. Just ninety-two rushing yards a game, only nine rushing touchdowns all season, rushing expected points added allowed of minus 59.7 — a one hundredth percentile number, the best run defense in the league by this measure. Per carry, opponents averaged a brutal minus 0.15 expected points, meaning every handoff against Seattle was, on average, a losing play. The front seven didn't just plug gaps — they created chaos. When your run defense is generating points instead of just preventing them, you're playing a different game than everyone else.

Seattle used their first pick of the 2026 draft on a running back at thirty-two — and then spent four of their next seven picks on the secondary. Eight picks, no top-thirty-one selection, a Day-One thumper out of Notre Dame, and a cornerback room about to get crowded. Here's what the data says about the Jadarian Price bet, why John Schneider jumped the line for a fifth-round guard, and the late-round corner pile that has Mike Macdonald grinning.

Seattle's 2025 rushing offense finished at minus twenty-four point one in total expected points added and minus zero point zero five per carry. They needed juice — and at thirty-two, they spent their top pick on it. Jadarian Price, Notre Dame, twenty-two years old: 113 carries for 674 yards and 11 rushing touchdowns, plus 6 catches for 87 yards and 2 scores. His predicted points added — the college equivalent of NFL expected points added — landed at plus zero point two one per play and plus twenty-three point four seven on the season. The athletic profile backs it: a Relative Athletic Score of eight point three three, a 0-to-10 grade comparing combine and pro-day testing to every running back since 1987. Top fifteen percent at the position.

The back end of the defense is where this class really lives. Seattle's 2025 pass defense already allowed minus zero point one expected points per play and just twenty passing touchdowns over seventeen games — they weren't broken back there, they're stacking it anyway. At sixty-four, Schneider grabbed TCU safety Bud Clark: 56 tackles, a sack, a tackle for loss and a half, 7 pass breakups, and a Relative Athletic Score of nine point one nine — top eight percent of safeties ever tested. At ninety-nine, Arkansas corner Julian Neal: 55 tackles, 2 tackles for loss, 10 pass breakups (tied for fifth in the SEC), and a nine point two eight athletic score — top seven percent of corners. Two Day-Two defensive backs, both north of nine on the athletic chart.

Then come the seventh-round corners — and this is where Macdonald lit up. He said straight-out you can never have too many corners, and he doesn't remember being on a roster with this many drafted at the position. Pick two-thirty-six: Toledo's Andre Fuller — 49 tackles, two and a half for loss, 10 pass breakups (second in the MAC), and a Relative Athletic Score of nine point zero five. Schneider called him a really good football player with versatility and special-teams value, and noted a great visit. Pick two-fifty-five: Arizona's Michael Dansby — 19 tackles, 10 pass breakups. Schneider's scouting summary was three words: competitive, quick, sticky. He admitted some fear-of-missing-out energy with so many Arizona DBs flying off the board, and noted Dansby self-reported a forty in the four-twos. Swaggy was the word Schneider used. Out loud. Twice.

One pick into the run defense room — and it wasn't fixing a leak. Seattle's 2025 run defense allowed minus zero point one five expected points per carry and only 9 rushing touchdowns all year. At two-forty-two, the Seahawks took Minnesota defensive tackle Deven Eastern: 38 tackles, 5 tackles for loss, two and a half sacks, and a Relative Athletic Score of six point nine five — middling by this class's standards. Schneider framed him as a gap player who can get up and down the line with pass-rush upside, leaning on the analytics staff's note that production-to-physical-profile held up.

The trenches got one swing, and Schneider moved up to take it. Seattle's 2025 offense allowed twenty-seven sacks and sixty quarterback hits over seventeen games — not a crisis, but a room that needed depth and competition. At one-forty-eight, the Seahawks grabbed Iowa guard Beau Stephens, twenty-three years old, with a Relative Athletic Score of seven point seven three — comfortably above average for the position. Schneider was openly surprised Stephens was still available, said the gap was too big and the talent too good to pass on, and confirmed compensatory-pick math justified the move up. Which side does Stephens project to? Schneider's answer was two words: either side.

One more on the offensive side. At one-ninety-nine, the Seahawks took Kansas receiver Emmanuel Henderson Junior: 45 catches for 766 yards (eighth in the Big Twelve) and 5 touchdowns. His predicted points added of plus zero point five eight per play and plus forty point four four on the season is, frankly, the most efficient receiving profile in this entire class — the smashed-the-stat-sheet number. The Relative Athletic Score is more pedestrian at six point three seven. The bet here is production over testing.

Pick of the draft. You can argue Price as the only first-rounder. You can argue Clark as the Day-Two athletic monster. The flag I'd plant is Julian Neal. He's the one defensive back who pairs elite athletic testing with the most translatable college pass-coverage production — ten breakups in the SEC isn't a scheme producing him, it's him producing in coverage. Add 55 tackles of run support, and you've got the multi-front, traits-heavy corner Macdonald keeps describing. Schneider talked about wanting players who wouldn't be in awe of a Super Bowl roster. Neal's profile says he won't be.

The story of Seattle's 2026 offseason is whether you can win the back end of your defense in April and have it show up in November. Four of eight picks went to the secondary. The front seven added one rotational tackle and zero edge rushers — and Macdonald acknowledged the edge room is currently a Jared Ivy, Jamie Sheriff, Connor Ouellette, Jaylen Gaines competition, with more free-agent additions hinted at after the comp-pick window opens. That's the stress test. If the corners and safeties hold up, this class ages into a defensive identity. If the pass rush can't get there, all the coverage in the world won't matter.