This is just a quibble, but I think both Noah Fant and Shelby Harris are quite a bit better than mediocre. Both are valuable starters.
Maybe “mediocre” is too harsh. Noah Fant seems like a pretty reliable starter, but he’s not a star. He might be an upgrade to Gerald Everett, who is the best TE that Seattle has now.
Shelby Harris seems like a depth addition. He was a 7th round pick in 2014. For his first couple of years, he was a practice squad/reserve player. His best year was in 2017 where he had 5.5 sacks. He did all right after that (aside from missing half of 2020, though these things happen), but still, he’s a DE with 22.5 sacks over an 8 year career. That’s an average of less than 3 sacks a year. I’m not sure that he’s someone I’d consider a valuable starter. Hopefully I’m wrong.
These aren’t All-Stars or Pro Bowlers. They aren’t exceptional players. They’re decent. but not a huge benefit for the team. Clearly Seattle sees value in them though, or they wouldn’t have included them in the trade.
ETA: Regarding Harris, Seattle really needs an upgrade at pass rush. It could change their entire defense. Prior to the Wilson trade, the assumption was that Seattle needed to go “all in” to capitalize on having a franchise QB, and one major way to do that was to fork out real money for a marquee player like a Chandler Jones. That’s why a player like Harris is somewhat “meh”. Not bad, but it’s like a Band-Aid on a major head wound.
I’m sure that it’ll start a hijack, but I think the Cutler trade is probably the better example. Favre was 39 at the time and in spite of coming off an excellent season, he was thought to be on his way out of the league in a year or two. Cutler was a Pro Bowler who had just finished a 4500 yard season. Hindsight says he was not the franchise guy Wilson is, but the narrative at the time made him out like the next big thing and on a rookie contract no-less.
Good example, and I’d forgotten about it. (Also, it happened one year more recently than the Favre trade.)
He’s was a 3-4 DE making $8M per year. He’s a guy who plays 16 games a year (4 of the last 5 years) at a position where that’s pretty uncommon. And he’s a guy who posted back-to-back 6 sack (full) seasons from the inside. He’s not a super star but he’s immediately the best DL the Seahawks have on the roster.
Carlos Dunlap is far better (almost triple the sack rate, many more tackles, forced fumbles, etc. and he had 8.5 sacks last year). And while not a DL, if used properly Jamal Adams is a pretty gifted pass rusher, in a career half as long he has had almost as many sacks as Harris.
One upside of Harris over Dunlap is that he’s a few years younger (30 vs 33). But he’s not the best DL they have at the moment, and he’s definitely not the upgrade they need.
The Seahawks are a bit weird with their scheme, I considered Dunlap a OLB in the LEO role in that system. Strangely he’s not even listed as a starter on any depth chart I can find. I can revise my statement to say he’s the best interior DL on the roster, which makes him quite a bit more than just a throw in in this deal.
Fair enough. 
Hopefully he’s an impact player, and not just another body out there. It won’t make much of a difference though, if they don’t have a QB. I guess we’ll see what Pete and John come up with.
(Please, please, please don’t be Jimmy Garoppolo. Ah crap, someone is saying exactly that.)
Here’s my not-so-bold prediction. Bobby Wagner is done in Seattle. Yes, he’s one of the best LBs in the NFL, but he’s in his 30s and is expensive. Seattle has a great replacement with a young and talented Jordyn Brooks, and Cody Barton has been really solid too. There was speculation that he’d be gone or have his deal restructured to allow for money to get more talent, but with Wilson gone, I can’t see how they’d hold onto Bobby. I expect him to be a pretty valuable trade item for a team willing to pay for him.
It’s a little weird for Seattle to going into this draft looking for a QB. This is one of the worst QB drafts in recent memory and there’s a glut of bad teams looking for QB at the top of the draft (as usual, but especially this year). Signing Jimmy G or some other journeyman is probably the play…wait a minute, is that Mitch Trubisky’s music?
My understanding is that 3-4 DE’s don’t go for sacks, they occupy the OL so one of the four LB’s (guess which one every play!) can rush the passer.
It’s unfair to compare a base 4-3 DE’s sack numbers – whose primary job is to rush the passer – with a 3-4 DE, whose job is more akin to nose tackle.
That said, if my team is 4-3 and I need a DE, I’m not even really looking at 3-4 DE’s. So in that respect, your point stands tall.
Corrections welcome. Most of my football knowledge is years out of date.
(Google said the Seahawks run base 4-3.)
Yeah, that’s my main point. He might be good at his job, but his job isn’t what they desperately needed last year.
Not a bad addition though.
They do. Though they have a new DC and changed a lot of the defensive coaches after the season. But I expect it will stay 4-3. The defense has always belonged to Pete Carroll during his tenure, as he’s a defense-minded coach, so I don’t expect that to change.
In a sacrilege as a Giants fan, I really don’t like the 3-4 as a scheme.
I’d take the 2007 lineup of Strahan, Osi, Tuck and Kiwanuka* over the 1986 lineup of Lawrence Taylor, Carl Banks, Gary Reasons and Harry Carson.
*Pierre-Paul would be a noticeable upgrade over Kiwanuka, who was merely decent, but JPP didn’t show up until 2010.
EDIT: I’m pretty stoned. It now occurs to me that all four LB’s start in a 3-4 but only two DEs start in a 4-3, making my statement silly on its face. But my original point, that I really don’t like 3-4, remains.
I got to looking at the draft order and was kind of shocked by the number of teams who probably should be looking at drafting a QB this year.
- Jacksonville Jaguars - NO
- Detroit Lions - Goff…YES
- Houston Texans - Watson/Mills…Maybe
- New York Jets - NO
- New York Giants - Jones…YES
- Carolina Panthers - Newton/Darnold…YES
- New York Giants (from CHI) - Jones, again…YES
- Atlanta Falcons - Ryan…YES
- Seattle Seahawks (from DEN) - Lock…YES
- New York Jets (from SEA) - NO
- Washington Commanders - Heineke/Fitzy…YES
- Minnesota Vikings - Cousins…Maybe
- Cleveland Browns - Mayfield…Maybe
- Baltimore Ravens - NO
- Philadelphia Eagles (from MIA) - NO (I think)
- Philadelphia Eagles (from IND) - NO
- Los Angeles Chargers - NO
- New Orleans Saints - Winston/Hill/Book…YES
- Philadelphia Eagles - NO
- Pittsburgh Steelers - Rudolph/Haskins…YES
- New England Patriots - NO
- Las Vegas Raiders - NO
- Arizona Cardinals - Murray…Maybe
- Dallas Cowboys - NO
- Buffalo Bills - NO
- Tennessee Titans - Tannehill…Maybe
- Tampa Bay Buccaneers - Trask…YES
- Green Bay Packers - NO
- Miami Dolphins (from SF) - NO (I think)
- Kansas City Chiefs - NO
- Cincinnati Bengals - NO
- Detroit Lions (from LAR) - YES
There’s 11 unequivocal yeses. A couple of those are duplicates, but those are still 2 first round picks that could be QBs (if there were enough to go around). All 5 maybes are legitimate too, no sports-talk hot takes there.
Just thinking out loud…if the Cardinals offered the Vikings Murray for Cousins straight up who says no?
Fair list, though the Titans would probably be looking more at a 3rd or 4th round project QB, not a first rounder.
Giants better fucking draft a QB or I’m going to lose my fucking mind. (How many blue chip QB prospects in this draft?)
As I was basking in the glow of four top-10 New Jersey picks, my mellow was rudely harshed by the Eagles. How the hell did they end up with three first rounders?!
Thats the number of QBs drafted each of the last 10 years. Saying 12 teams need to draft a QB seems right around par for the course.
What will be fascinating to watch is the QBs rise up the draft boards. Personally, I’m not a fan of any of the QBs coming out this year, but it always seems inevitable that some teams get stupidly desperate and will overdraft project QBs.
With the combine showing, Malik Willis is looking good to shoot up the draft boards of desperate teams, as might Desmond Ridder. Between now and the draft one or two, hell maybe 5, QBs will go from “second or third round project” to “top 10 draft pick”.
The only thing more deliciously fun to watch than desperate teams overdrafting a QB will be the rehabilitation of Mitchell Trubisky into a sought after starting QB.
That’s a slightly different thing though. In every draft teams with entrenched starting QBs draft backups or developmental guys. Teams with a hole at QB sometimes draft 2. What I’m seeing is that this year there are more teams in dire need of a signal caller than there usually are QBs drafted in toto.
Then again, sometimes they even trade up in the first round to draft a QB.
As a Packer fan, I saw what you did there. Well played. 
Just a little more evidence that the Seahawks have decided to tear everything down and rebuild: they are also releasing their defensive captain, linebacker Bobby Wagner, who was second-team All Pro last season.
Maybe, but in the NFL dropping your two highest paid players isn’t necessarily a tear down. They may just end up rebalancing their roster with more mid-range salary guys which oftentimes is a net-positive for the team’s ability to win. Of course, without a QB you’re hosed but there’s lots of moves yet to be made.