The Seattle Seahawks cash conundrum and the fifth-year options
Sunday marks 4 weeks since the Seattle Seahawks thumped the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX 29-13, laying claim to the title of World Champions. Sunday additionally marks 4 years since the Seahawks send Russell Wilson to the Denver Broncos in alternate for 2 first spherical picks, two second spherical picks and a trio of gamers.
The three gamers who got here again to Seattle included Drew Lock, Noah Fant and Shelby Harris, with Fant shortly changing into the first spherical decide for whom the Seahawks exercised the fifth yr choice later that spring. Subsequently, John Schneider used the picks so as to add Charles Cross and Boye Mafe in the 2022 NFL Draft, earlier than choosing up Devon Witherspoon and Derick Hall in the 2023 NFL Draft.
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That led to the 2025 offseason when Cross grew to become the second member of the Seahawks to have the fifth yr choice exercised, and leads into the 2026 offseason the place each Witherspoon and Jaxon Smith-Njigba have fifth yr options on which Seattle must make choices.
Whether or to not train the fifth yr options on these two gamers is as near a no brainer as potential, given their 5 Pro Bowls in six mixed NFL seasons. This is very the case for JSN, given the state of the broad receiver market, and the indisputable fact that including a yr to his rookie contract at a $23,852M cap hit is a cut price at a time when elite broad receivers can command contracts in the $40M vary.
However, whereas the choice to train the choice looks like a no brainer, there may be one other issue at play that complicates issues from a cash movement perspective. Specifically, fifth yr options are totally assured at train, and in the current case of JSN and Witherspoon, the options cowl the 2027 NFL season. That signifies that exercising the options means Witherspoon and JSN would have totally assured salaries in a future league yr, which might, after all, set off the funding rule.
The funding rule, as Field Gulls has defined elsewhere, requires staff to place totally assured salaries in future league years into escrow, that means if the Seahawks train the fifth yr options of Witherspoon and JSN, they’d then be on the hook for $45,013M of totally assured 2027 base salaries for the pair. Putting that cash into escrow is little greater than prepaying the 2027 wage of the pair, so it is not an enormous deal.
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However, given the cash spending obligations of the Seahawks in 2026 under the minimum spending requirements of the CBA that Field Gulls coated Wednesday, exercising the fifth yr options provides tens of hundreds of thousands extra in cash obligations for 2026. The purpose why is as a result of although the staff should fulfill the funding rule and deposit the cash, the wage being deposited is to cowl 2027 obligations and due to this fact wouldn’t be included in the calculations for the minimal spending thresholds.
Now, after all, since contract extensions for elite younger gamers will be entrance loaded with a big cash signing bonus, the simplest way for Seattle to satisfy its cash spend obligations is to increase Witherspoon and JSN. The signing bonuses of contract extensions alone would seemingly put the staff near, if not in extra of the 2026 cash spending necessities.
Thus, the conundrum the staff faces is that if it workouts the fifth yr options whereas opting to attend till subsequent offseason to signal the pair to extensions, it not solely seemingly prices extra by approach of a better APY after one more yr of cap development, it will require assembly the 2026 league yr cash spend obligations on high of creating the requisite deposits to fulfill the funding rule. The staff can actually do each, however for a company as frugal as the Seahawks, it will be out of character. Specifically, it will require tying up tens of hundreds of thousands in cash that do not must be tied up as soon as extensions are agreed to for each gamers. In quick, the staff can kill two birds with one stone. Extending Witherspoon and JSN retains them in Seahawks uniforms going ahead, whereas additionally knocking out the cash spend obligations of the CBA.
