The Seahawks have a new offensive coordinator this season, but it might be hard to notice any major changes once they hit the field this fall.
Brian Fleury was the 49ers’ tight ends coach before being tabbed to succeed Klint Kubiak in Seattle and both coaches were on Kyle Shanahan’s 49ers staff during the 2023 season. Kubiak’s offense was built off similar principles to the ones Shanahan has run throughout his career and quarterback Sam Darnold said on Wednesday that it has been “more of the same” under Fleury.
“Thankfully it hasn’t been too much of a transition. . . . It’s a lot of the same stuff [with] Fleury obviously coming from San Francisco, but a couple different wrinkles here and there,” Darnold said, via Brady Henderson of ESPN.com. “So it’s been good that way to be able to get some of that same verbiage but just a couple different wrinkles.”
Darnold said that Fleury’s “command over the entire system has been incredible” and the hope in Seattle will be that the minor tweaks will lead to the same kind of results come the regular season.
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The last time that edge rusher Derick Hall took the field, he had two sacks that helped the Seahawks secure a Super Bowl win over the Patriots.
Hall is now set to have four more years to help add more Lombardi Trophies to the collection in Seattle. He signed a three-year extension with the reigning champs this week and he said the prospect of future titles were more important to him than anything he might be able to land on the open market as a free agent next year.
“I know we’re going to win a lot of games and a lot of championships here,” Hall said, via Andrew Destin of the Associated Press. “So, I’m willing to sacrifice whatever everybody else thought I’d be willing to make to be here and with this team.”
The Seahawks had to part ways with a number of key players this offseason, including Super Bowl MVP Kenneth Walker, because of the difficulties involved with keeping the band together in the Super Bowl era. Hall went in the other direction and that’s a happy prospect for the Seahawks’ defensive future.
Talk that Aaron Donald could come out of retirement and return to the Rams had Seahawks wide receiver Cooper Kupp reaching out to Donald directly, and telling him not to do it.
Kupp told Rich Eisen that he reached out to Donald and told him he needs to stay retired.
“I already texted him and told him he’s not allowed. So we’re good,” Kupp joked. “I texted Aaron and said, ‘Don’t even think about it.’ I left it at that, so we’re good. I’m not worried about it. I already nipped it in the bud. No one has to worry.”
Kupp said the Seahawks know they’re going to have their hands full this season with the players already on the Rams, and an already tough defense adding Donald is something Kupp does not want to see.
“I don’t know what’s gonna happen. I love Aaron. He’s such a good football player, great dude.I loved taking the field with him in L.A. I don’t know what’s going to happen. That would be crazy. He’s a very, very good football player. I don’t care how old he is, how long he’s not played, Aaron Donald is Aaron Donald. But it doesn’t matter because I told him he can’t.”
Kupp and Donald were teammates on the Rams from 2017 to 2023. Kupp has never played against Donald, and wants to keep it that way.
The narrow gap between the Seahawks and Rams may have been closed, and then some, with this week’s acquisition of defensive end Myles Garrett by L.A.
Meeting with reporters on Wednesday, Seattle quarterback Sam Darnold was asked about the move.
“Myles is a great player,” Darnold said. “Shoot, Jared Verse is a great player as well, but I don’t think we see them until Week 16, so we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”
He’s right. Arguably the best current rivalry in football won’t be renewed until Christmas, with a prime-time game between the two best teams in the league from 2025.
That gives Darnold and the Seahawks 15 weeks of the regular season to not have to worry about Garrett. After a Saturday, December 19, game at the Eagles, the Seahawks will have six days to get ready for the guy who managed to rack up 23.0 sacks in 2025.
Russell Wilson has made it official.
In a social-media video posted on Wednesday, Wilson announced his retirement from the NFL and confirmed that he will be working for CBS, on The NFL Today.
A third-round pick in 2012, Wilson won the starting job as a rookie, beating out free-agent arrival Matt Flynn.
Wilson made it to the Pro Bowl nine times in 10 seasons with the Seahawks. Traded to the Broncos in 2022, he had two seasons in Denver, one in Pittsburgh, and one with the Giants.
The Jets had interest in adding Wilson as a backup to Geno Smith, who once backed up Wilson in Seattle. Ultimately, Wilson chose TV over continuing to play.
In the years to come, Wilson’s Hall of Fame candidacy will be debated. Former Patriots defensive back Devin McCourty said on Tuesday’s PFT Live that Wilson was in the second tier of NFL quarterbacks during McCourty’s career, which largely overlapped with Wilson’s.
Still, Wilson had a strong run in the NFL. He defied his size, won a Super Bowl, and was the highest-paid player in the NFL, twice.
The Seahawks have reached a new deal with one of their key defensive players.
Seattle and edge rusher Derick Hall have agreed to a three-year contract extension, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Schefter notes Hall’s new contract is worth $42 million, which could move up to $46.5 million, with $21 million guaranteed. It ties Hall to the organization through 2029.
Hall, 25, was the No. 37 overall pick of the 2023 draft. He has appeared in 48 games with 17 starts over his first three years, tallying 10.0 sacks, 12 tackles for loss, and 38 QB hits. He recorded 2.0 sacks in Super Bowl LX to help Seattle cruise to victory over New England.
Seattle had acquired the pick that the club used to draft Hall in the trade that sent Russell Wilson to Denver.
Russell Wilson is staying in New York. But he won’t be playing for the Jets.
Via Adam Schefter of ESPN, Wilson is “finalizing a deal” to become an analyst with CBS.
Wilson will be joining The NFL Today, which currently features James Brown, Nate Burleson, and Bill Cowher. A seat opened when Matt Ryan left to become the Falcons’ president of football.
The Jets were considering Wilson as a veteran backup to Geno Smith, who once was Wilson’s backup in Seattle. Wilson has said he had an offer from the Jets.
It’s rare for any quarterback who was once the highest-paid player in the league to happily accept the second spot on a depth chart. (Joe Flacco is the one of the most significant exceptions.) Wilson was the Giants’ starter when he signed there in 2025, and he was the Steelers’ starter when he signed there in 2024. His days as a starter are and were over.
As to the biggest TV opportunities, those seats don’t always pop open. With Ryan exiting, there was a current opportunity for Wilson. If he didn’t take it now, it may not have been there in a year.
Wilson, a third-round pick out of Wisconsin, started for the Seahawks from 2012 through 2021. He was traded to the Broncos in 2022.
A Super Bowl winner and a 10-time Pro Bowler, Wilson was never a first-team All-Pro or a serious MVP candidate. At 16th on the all-time passing yardage list and 12th on the all-time passing touchdown list, he’ll have a somewhat challenging case to get to Canton.
That’s where a great career in TV can make a difference. Yes, the debate will be about his playing career. And, yes, his case will get stronger if he becomes a successful and enduring presence in NFL broadcast universe.
Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald is going to like defensive tackle Byron Murphy’s approach to the 2026 season.
Macdonald said recently that he wants the Seahawks to “run it forward” rather than think about repeating the things they did on their way to winning the Super Bowl in February. Murphy is on board with that mindset and he said that he believes the Seahawks will need to “start back from the bottom to work our way up back to the top.”
“I feel like we gotta start from scratch,” Murphy said, via the teams website. “I feel like we should ask ourselves, what are the things we can improve on as far as what we did last year? How can we build on that? How can [we] just keep going and fix little errors, the little mistakes that we had last year. How can [we] go about that and perfect that and then take it to another level.”
Murphy acknowledged that it is “very challenging” to pull off what he hopes to see the team do this season and they’ll be starting the process against the same team they beat in the Super Bowl when they host the Patriots on September 9.
They have to install playing surfaces that meet exacting standards. They have to change the names of the facilities. They have to shut down all other business (such as major concerts) for the duration of the World Cup.
Given the hoops through which the 11 NFL stadiums will have to jump in order to placate FIFA, it’s fair to ask whether it’s worth it.
Ben Volin of the Boston Globe recently took a look at that question. Said an NFL official from a team that won’t be hosting any of the World Cup games, “I know more than a few teams weren’t disappointed to lose the bid.”
That could be sour grapes, because those who won the right to host the matches are crowing about it.
“Can’t sleep,” Cowboys owner and G.M. Jerry Jones said recently, per Volin. “This is a great chance to associate with the worldwide love with soccer, and lets us put a little notch on our belt and share it with what soccer’s about, too. They’ll never be able to take away that we held those games in that stadium.”
Cowboys executive Stephen Jones echoed the sentiment: “We’ll be shut down all summer. But it’s worth it. I mean, this is about brand and, you know, being a part of something special.”
The Joneses wanted to host the matches badly enough to give up their suite for the matches.
“I think I’ve got to go someplace else, but that was a part of it,” Jerry Jones said. “We did a lot of things to make this work.”
The Cowboys, Patriots, Falcons, Texans, Chargers/Rams, Giants/Jets, Chiefs, Seahawks, 49ers, Dolphins, and Eagles will be hosting World Cup games in their stadiums.
The total revenue is projected, per Volin, to be roughly $11 billion. FIFA will pay rent for the stadiums, while keeping the revenue from sponsorships, tickets, suites, merchandise, concessions, and parking.
So how much will the teams get for hosting the World Cup? Per Volin, the terms “have been kept under wraps.”
Given that folks like Jones are not known for doing bad deals, they’ll surely be making more money to host the World Cup matches than they would have made in a normal summer.
Still, it’s a headache. Extra work, extra expenses, extra hassles.
Not to mention the P.R. bruise that comes from the perception/reality that NFL owners who are giving FIFA the surfaces it demands while stubbornly refusing to do the same for pro football players.
The hiring of Seahawks assistant G.M. Nolan Teasley as the Vikings’ new G.M. will carry a specific benefit for his former team.
Per the league, Teasley qualifies as a diverse candidate under the NFL provision that gives the former team of a newly-hired G.M. or head coach a pair of third-round compensatory draft picks.
The only question is whether Teasley will be Minnesota’s “primary football executive.” That requirement prevented the Bears from receiving the compensatory draft picks when assistant General Manager Ian Cunningham was hired to be the Falcons G.M. The league decided that president of football Matt Ryan is the “primary football executive” in Atlanta.
The Bears appealed the decision to the league, and Bears fans continue to be mystified by the outcome — especially since Ryan has made it clear that Cunningham is a General Manager “in every facet of the word.”
Minnesota has no similar position to Ryan’s job with the Falcons. The only alternative to Teasley would be coach Kevin O’Connell. But there has been no indication that, moving forward, O’Connell will emerge as the top football executive for the Vikings, with full control over the roster and the draft.
The NFL’s full collection of diversity of initiatives have recently come under attack by Florida’s attorney general. The Seahawks getting two extra third-round draft picks undoubtedly will spark a reaction from those who, in the current climate, attack efforts aimed at enhancing diversity, equity, and inclusion.
