Should Seattle Seahawks Consider Tanking Strategy?

The Seattle Seahawks could benefit from a higher pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, but the team has enough pieces to get back to the playoffs.

Seattle Seahawks cornerback and Pensacola native Devon Witherspoon speaks with young athletes during the Martin Emerson Jr. Free Youth Football Camp at Pine Forest High School Saturday, July 6, 2024. | John Blackie/jblackie@pnj.com / USA

The Seattle Seahawks are hoping to escape the mediocre tier in the NFL for the upcoming season.

The past two years have led to 9-8 records, which have seen the Seahawks teetering on the line of playoff team and just outside the postseason. That's a dangerous place to be in the NFL as Seattle has failed to experience playoff success while also being unable to start over.

That's why Bleacher Report writer Alex Ballentine suggests that the Seahawks should consider tanking in the upcoming season.

"If going 9-8 and flirting with the playoffs was a good bar for Seattle, they likely wouldn't have made the choice to move on from Pete Carroll as head coach," Ballentine writes. "However, making the move to sign Mike Macdonald opens the door for the Seahawks to lean into tanking toward a high draft pick in 2025. The Niners have a strong grip on the NFC West right now. But the Seahawks could ostensibly make a run at a wildcard spot and hope that Sam Howell can be the quarterback of the future. Instead, trading an aging player like Tyler Lockett in the middle of the season might a tanking move worth considering to increase their draft investment and potentially get a new quarterback prospect in 2025."

The Seahawks are far from the San Francisco 49ers, but they are also far from the Arizona Cardinals in their current setup. Seattle has a chance to be a very good team in the upcoming season, but likely not a Super Bowl contender. That's why they can choose to make a move or two that will allow them to select players (and potentially a long-term solution at quarterback) that can get them closer to putting themselves in that conversation.

Sometimes, the way to move forwards is to move backwards, and it certainly makes some sense for Seattle to do that. However, the Seahawks believe they have a playoff team already in the building, so they would be silly to hit the reset button right now. They should give coach Macdonald a chance to establish himself before putting him in a position to fail.