John Schneider, Seahawks Have 'Lot to Figure Out' On Offensive Line

Through free agency, the Seattle Seahawks have addressed numerous needs on the defensive side of the ball, but questions persist along the offensive line with limited experience or depth.

Seattle Seahawks v Tennessee Titans / Wesley Hitt/GettyImages

ORLANDO, Fl. - Checking off their most prominent offseason priority over the past three weeks and change, general manager John Schneider and the Seattle Seahawks have strengthened the middle of their defense at all three levels through free agency.

Diligently building what new coach Mike Macdonald called a "strong spine," the Seahawks first re-signed standout defensive tackle Leonard Williams to a three-year extension and followed up by adding massive nose tackle Johnathan Hankins to the mix up front. At linebacker and safety, the team handed out a quartet of contracts to Jerome Baker, Tyrel Dodson, Rayshawn Jenkins, and K'Von Wallace to replace departed former starters Bobby Wagner, Jordyn Brooks, Jamal Adams, and Quandre Diggs, getting younger and cheaper overall adding schematic fits at both position groups.

While Macdonald and Schneider are encouraged by the moves orchestrated to help shore up a run defense that has ranked in the bottom three in the league in each of the past two seasons, however, both acknowledged much work remains left unfinished in the middle of Seattle's offensive line. After losing four-year starter Damien Lewis to Carolina and former starting center Evan Brown to Arizona early in free agency, the team has only signed former Rams reserve Tremayne Anchrum, leaving significant question marks at both guard spots as well as center.

Speaking with reporters at the NFL annual meeting on Tuesday, Schneider indicated the lack of activity in the trenches on offense resulted in large part due to the spending spree other teams engaged in signing guards and centers early in free agency at positions lacking depth across the league.

After starting 10 games as a rookie, Anthony Bradford now stands out as the most experienced member of the Seahawks interior offensive line. / Ric Tapia/GettyImages

“Obviously, offensive line, we have a lot to figure out there," Schneider said. "But that's just, you guys saw it in free agency. Damien Lewis, these guys, they're good players. There's just a lack of depth that if you looked at free agency, when you look at a draft board and here's the defensive line, here's the offensive line, and you had the players just ranked, you're like, 'okay, here are the defensive players, or here are the defensive lineman. Here are the offensive lineman.' And you have to balance your cap. You have to balance your team.... You have to be careful.”

Earlier in the day, Macdonald shared similar sentiments on the state of the Seahawks offensive line, hinting that more moves would be coming in free agency and the upcoming draft to reinforce the unit.

“It’s a work in progress and we’re not done by any stretch of the imagination," Macdonald added. "Obviously there is some great competition going to happen in that room and we expect some higher level play this year from those guys and we’re out at work at it, but I think like we are not hitting the panic button or anything like that. We don’t play until September so a lot of time to figure out who the right guys are and who the right opportunities are to make the team the best we can.’’

In the aftermath of Lewis' departure - and with free agent Phil Haynes still unsigned - Seattle only has three guards currently on the roster. After starting 10 games as a rookie, 2023 fifth-round pick Anthony Bradford is now the seasoned veteran of the group and if a game happened next weekend, he'd be penciled into the lineup at right guard, where he played all 659 of his snaps a year ago.

At 332 pounds, Bradford blocked well in spurts as a rookie, including helping Ken Walker III and the Seahawks rushing attack eclipse the 100-yard mark three times in a four game span from Week 4 to Week 8. While Pro Football Focus gave him a dismal 38.9 pass blocking grade and he surrendered nearly 30 pressures, he only yielded one sack on 394 pass blocking reps, posted a respectable 96.3 percent pass blocking efficiency rate, and only drew four penalties.

Away from Bradford, Seattle only has one other guard on the roster with more than 100 regular season snaps to his name in Anchrum, who started just one game in four seasons in Los Angeles and has primarily seen action in either mop-up duty or subbing in for injuries. Despite his lack of experience, Schneider credited the team's scouting department for keeping tabs on the former Clemson standout, who he believes could "definitely" be a starter if he can stay healthy after allowing only two pressures on 57 pass blocking snaps with the Rams.

"He started 35 games, played left tackle, right tackle in college. He has been on two national championship teams. He's had a little bit of rough go from a durability standpoint," Schneider said of Anchrum. "But Willie [Schneider], Nolan [Teasley], DJ [Hord], and Armani [Perez], those guys did a great job of like, 'hey, these are the reps. Let's watch the reps. This guy's got shot.'"

Aside from Bradford and Anchrum, the Seahawks only have one other player - recently signed center Nick Harris - who offers any regular season experience at either guard spot on the roster. The former Washington starter logged 161 snaps at right guard in four seasons with the Browns, but for now, he's expected to compete against second-year center Olu Oluwatimi to succeed Brown at the pivot position.

On Tuesday, Schneider did name drop McClendon Curtis as a potential competitors to slide inside after initially being signed last September following injuries to starters Charles Cross and Abraham Lucas. The ex-Chattanooga alum played the majority of his college career at right guard before moving outside to left tackle as a senior and saw action at guard and tackle during the 2023 Senior Bowl before signing with the Raiders as an undrafted free agent.

Schneider also referenced former UCLA lineman Raiqwon O'Neal, who also joined the Seahawks after being signed off the Buccaneers practice squad at the same time as Curtis, though he has never played guard at the college or NFL level and likely will compete as a backup tackle this summer.

"McClendon [Curtis] and Raiqwon O’Neal, we acquired those guys the first week. We lost both tackles and so our pro staff did a great job," Schneider said. "We basically were kind of forced to go out and get what, in our opinion, was the top two offensive tackles on practice squads. So getting O'Neal and McClendon, that was a big deal for us.... Let's not forget about those guys. Offensive line is kind of like, this is constant just because of the overall lack of depth of the position in pro football, college football, high school. It's just lack of depth.”

With the calendar soon set to flip to April, Schneider still has time to kick the tires on unsigned veterans such as Laken Tomlinson or Dalton Risner, who each have started at least 70 games in the NFL and at minimum would provide Seattle with solid stop-gap alternatives in the interior along with much-needed leadership for a young offensive line. Both currently remain unsigned, while bringing back Haynes might not be out of the realm of possibility on a veteran's minimum contract.

Of course, most likely, the Seahawks will look to take advantage of an incoming draft class that - at least on paper - appears to be strong at the guard position. Picking 16th overall, standout prospects such as Oregon's Jackson Powers-Johnson, Washington's Troy Fautanu, or Duke's Graham Barton could be top first round options to immediately bolster the line with a versatile, blue chip day one starter, as each of those three players offers positional flexibility and top-flight athletic traits.

After opting not to jump into the spending spree as other teams threw massive contracts at veteran guards at the beginning of free agency, Schneider's opinion of the draft class clearly weighed into that decision, but he will need to hit on a few linemen next month. Poised to attack the deficiency with at least seven picks at his disposal, a plan looks to be in place with the goal of building an equally strong spine on offense compared to the other side of the football.