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Rookie Minicamp
Rookie Minicamp Is Done. Richard Sherman Made Sure It Started Right.
The Seahawks wrapped their two-day rookie minicamp on Saturday at the VMAC, and Mike Macdonald walked away satisfied. “I think we hit our goals,” he told reporters. Sixty-eight players cycled through in two days. Most of them won’t be back. The ones who matter already know how things work around here.
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Players cycled through the VMAC during the two-day rookie minicamp.
But the headline moment happened on Day 1, when Richard Sherman walked onto the practice field and started coaching up third-round pick Julian Neal. Nobody scheduled it. Nobody had to. Sherman, a fifth-round pick turned Hall of Fame-caliber corner, found the 6-2 rookie from Arkansas and gave him pointers on technique and mentality. Neal was still processing it afterward. “First day of minicamp and Richard Sherman is coming to me and telling me some stuff?” he said.
Macdonald loved it. “He’s one of the best to ever do it, which is cool and he’s ours,” the coach said. “Technique is important, but I think just the mentality that it takes to play DB and corner at a high level for our organization, breathe life into these guys.” Sherman also worked with safety Larry Worth and cornerback Andre Fuller. The man still has a key to the building. Macdonald wants to make sure that never changes.
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The best cornerback in franchise history walked onto a practice field and started coaching the next one. Nobody scheduled it. Nobody had to.
The secondary is being rebuilt in Sherman’s image. Neal at 6-2 and 208 pounds. Bud Clark at 6-2 and 190. Schneider is drafting size the way he did when he built the Legion of Boom, and now the original architect is on the field showing them how to use it.
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Free Agency
The Comp Pick Deadline Has Passed. Fowler Is Still Out There.
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Fowler played all 17 games for Dallas last season, posted three sacks and 30 pressures, and earned a career-best 77.6 PFF grade. He already knows defensive coordinator Aden Durde from overlapping stints in Atlanta and Dallas. The scheme fit is clean. The price should be cheap. A one-year deal in the $6 million range would be the expectation.
77.6
Dante Fowler’s PFF overall grade in 2025 — the highest of his 11-year career.
The draft is over. Edge rusher was not addressed at any point. Nwosu, Hall, Lawrence, Ivey, and the UDFA signings are the room. That’s it. Fowler is the one name that changes the math, and every day that passes without a signing is a day the room stays thinner than it should be.
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AROUND THE COOP
Around the Coop
The NFL distributed 2026 crew assignments to referees this week amid what ESPN’s Kevin Seifert calls “indications of continued progress” on a new CBA. The deadline is still May 31. Progress is a word that does a lot of heavy lifting when you remember what happened in 2012. NBC Sports
Jadarian Price wore No. 8 at rookie minicamp after wearing No. 24 at Notre Dame. Tyrone Broden, the 6-5 wide receiver switching to cornerback, changed to No. 31. If Broden plays a regular-season snap at corner, he’d be the tallest in NFL history at the position. Seahawks.com
Beau Stephens, the fifth-round guard out of Iowa, told reporters that Seattle’s offense looks similar to what he ran in college. That’s the kind of thing that makes a training camp competition very short. Anthony Bradford, check your rearview. Seahawks.com
The NFL schedule is targeting a May 13-14 release. The Seahawks host the Wednesday Night opener on September 9 at Lumen Field. Mike Wilbon all but named Chicago as the opponent. When that schedule drops, the countdown to banner night gets very real. Heavy
NFC WEST SCHADENFREUDE REPORT
RAMS
Stafford still hasn’t spoken to Ty Simpson. Not a text. Not a phone call. Simpson admitted it on Day 2 of the Rams’ post-draft availability, adding that Stafford’s wife reached out on social media. McVay has been on a media blitz insisting everyone is “lockstep,” while also confessing his grumpy draft-night face was partly about how Stafford would react. The Boston Globe called the Simpson pick a “mess” and noted McVay admitted the QB’s commitment is year-to-year. They drafted a developmental quarterback at 13 with the reigning MVP under center, and the MVP found out hours before Round 1. This will definitely not become a storyline.
NINERS
Brandon Aiyuk stopped showing up at the facility. Not a text back, not an explanation — just gone. John Lynch confirmed it’s “safe to say” he has played his last snap as a Niner. Shanahan said Aiyuk “cut off communications with anyone in the building.” They voided $27 million in guarantees and signed Mike Evans to patch the wound. Meanwhile, George Kittle is rehabbing a torn Achilles — he’s targeting a Week 1 return and Shanahan says he should be ready, but “should” is doing a lot of heavy lifting on a surgically repaired Achilles going into September. PFF gave the draft class a D. Lynch’s response: “We’ve got consensus in this building.” That’s the energy you need when your star receiver just ghosted the entire organization.
CARDINALS
Arizona went 3-14, fired Jonathan Gannon, hired Mike LaFleur, and then used the No. 3 overall pick on Jeremiyah Love, a running back. LaFleur’s postgame explanation: “I was hoping nobody called, and I really didn’t care what the offer was.” Let that breathe. They could have had almost anything in the trade market. They took the running back. They still have James Conner, Tyler Allgeier, and Trey Benson on the roster — that’s four backs for a team that won three games. Carson Beck went 65th. Their third head coach in five years has very strong feelings about this running game.
SEACHICKENS TRIVIA
Brian Blades spent his entire 11-year NFL career with the Seattle Seahawks after being drafted in the second round out of Miami in 1988. He finished as the franchise’s second-leading receiver behind Steve Largent. How many career receptions did Blades record as a Seahawk?
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581 receptions for 7,620 yards and 34 touchdowns. Blades posted four 1,000-yard seasons and earned a Pro Bowl nod in 1989, and was once described as ‘one of the toughest pound-for-pound players that the Seahawks have ever had.’
THIS DAY IN SEAHAWKS HISTORY
1977
May 3, 1977
The Seahawks Trade Away Tony Dorsett
On May 3, 1977, the Seahawks traded the second overall pick in the NFL Draft to the Dallas Cowboys, who used it to select running back Tony Dorsett. In return, Seattle received Dallas’s first-round pick (offensive lineman Steve August), three second-round picks, and pieces that became linebacker Terry Beeson, who set a franchise record with 153 tackles in 1978 that still stands. Dorsett went on to a Hall of Fame career. Seattle got a franchise tackles record holder. Football trades are weird.
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The schedule drops in eleven days. The banner goes up in September. Everything between now and then is just stretching before the sprint. Go Hawks. — The Rooster