Pre-Draft Connections Helping Seahawks 2022 Rookie Class Gel Quickly at Minicamp

RENTON, WA - Starring for Cincinnati and UTSA, two schools from different regions of the country and different conferences, Coby Bryant and Tariq Woolen have never been teammates before.

But as the pair of rookie cornerbacks kick start their respective NFL careers with the Seahawks, the two already have excellent chemistry developing. First meeting each other at the Senior Bowl, they struck a friendship in Mobile and continued to draw closer at the NFL combine in Indianapolis.

"I met with Tariq in the Senior Bowl and at the combine, so it's like I've been seeing him a little too much actually," Bryant laughed. "That's my guy though. We're already close, he talks more than me. I'm a guy that stays grounded and stays low key, he's the guy who brings up the room and be talkative."

While Woolen, who the Seahawks picked 153rd overall in the fifth round, hasn't been able to participate in the first two sessions of the minicamp due to a sore hamstring, he's been focusing on mental reps and took part in walkthrough drills. On the sidelines, he's been proactive cheering on his new teammates, including getting fired up when Bryant nearly jumped a comeback route for an interception in Saturday's practice session.

Even before stepping onto the field to play with Bryant, after getting to know him well in the pre-draft process over the past few months, Woolen expects that relationship to pay dividends for both of them playing and learning together in Seattle's secondary.

“It makes it a lot smoother just because you already got another guy to talk to," Woolen said. "I already know him. [You can talk] about this play or that, it doesn’t have to be about football. Just building that relationship with me and him, it’ll make things easier in the locker room and building chemistry.”

Looking at Seattle's nine-player draft class, in what has been a noticeable theme during the first few days of practice, Bryant and Woolen are far from the only two players with previous relationships or connections with their new teammates.

Along the offensive line, first-round pick Charles Cross and third-round pick Abraham Lucas had never met one another prior to the combine in March. Playing in different parts of the country for Mississippi State and Washington State respectively, the opportunity to face one another never presented itself, and with Cross being an early entrant for the draft, he wasn't eligible for the Senior Bowl either.

But when they first spoke in Indianapolis, the two soft-spoken linemen hit it off famously. And while they came from two programs separated by nearly 2,300 miles, they shared something significant in common: both had played two seasons apiece for coach Mike Leach, who left Washington State prior to the 2020 season to take over at Mississippi State, excelling in his pass-heavy Air Raid offense.

With both standout tackles coming from schemes predicated on slinging the pigskin all over the field, Cross and Lucas will have to get acclimated to playing out of a three-point stance with their hand in the dirt after playing exclusively out of a two-point stance in college. They will also have to learn new terminology running pro-style concepts that likely weren't part of their previous systems.

But neither player seems deterred by such challenges and Cross told reporters on Friday that he believes being able to come in together on the same team will help both him and Lucas get up to speed faster.

"It's pretty helpful having another guy I can talk to and relate to," Cross said. "He's very physical, plays mean, tough, nasty, and he's a competitor."

If that assessment of Lucas' style of play sounds familiar, well, it's almost word for word how Cross described himself moments after being drafted ninth overall by the Seahawks. Not viewing that revelation as a coincidence when a reporter brought it up on Friday, he indicated it was simply a case of "great minds thinking alike."

On the other side of the line, the Seahawks also doubled up on pass rushers from the rugged Big Ten, selecting Minnesota's Boye Mafe and Ohio State's Tyreke Smith in the second and fifth round respectively. After competing against each other in one of college football's premier conferences, they quickly developed a bond as teammates for the National Team at the Senior Bowl, pushing one another in drill work.

“Boye, when you see him, he’s all smiles. He’s just like me," Smith said on Saturday. "I feel like we just instantly connected at the Senior Bowl when we were there. I feel like we had a connection because we made each other work hard and we both turned each other up in a way. Boye’s my guy, I was happy to see him at the combine and I was happy to see him again when we met up here.”

As the Seahawks transition towards a 3-4 defense under coordinator Clint Hurtt and associate head coach Sean Desai, Mafe and Smith will have a chance to vie for early snaps rotating in at the two outside linebacker spots. Bringing different skill sets to the field, they could blossom into an interesting tandem alongside Darrell Taylor and Uchenna Nwosu hunting down quarterbacks off the edge.

Away from just position groups, seventh-round receiver Bo Melton also participated in the Senior Bowl and got to know Bryant, who he went against in one-on-one drills. Woolen met Lucas on one of his top-30 visits, while Lucas had the privilege of going to battle against Mafe for several one-on-one reps in Mobile, calling him an "underrated" talent with great hand technique.

From Melton's perspective, those previous encounters have made it easier for everyone to get comfortable in their first week with a new team and even considering the majority of players participating in minicamp won't be on the roster past Sunday's final session, he's already seen the positive impact of those prior relationships between the lines in the first couple of practices.

“I feel like a lot of our guys create relationships before we step on the field in the lunchroom and in the locker room," Melton said. "A lot of guys were at the Senior Bowl so we kind of had a connection already. Getting to know everyone in the locker room, being around them kind of created a comfortable environment. Along with the staff, created a very great environment as soon as you walked in so I feel like it helped on the field."

Of course, all of Seattle's incoming rookies will eventually have to start from scratch building relationships with veterans when they hit the field together for organized team activities and mandatory minicamp later this month. That will be a much different animal from a competition and social standpoint and plenty of rookie learning moments will come with the territory.

But as the Seahawks transition into a new era with no remaining members of their most recent Super Bowl squad, having a large draft class with numerous players who already have chemistry with one another will be nothing but a positive moving forward. As they grow together, those bonds could make a world of difference as the organization aims to quickly climb back into contention in the NFC West.