Amid a chaotic NFL offseason that has featured a superstar getting traded seemingly every day, could DK Metcalf be next?
The Seahawks triggered a rebuild when they sent Super Bowl-winning quarterback Russell Wilson to the Broncos in exchange for a haul of draft picks. Metcalf, a second-round pick in 2019, is entering the final year of his rookie contract, and the team has to make a decision on whether or not to extend him.
One would think they would for a player of his caliber, but considering how teams have unloaded the truck to acquire wide receivers this offseason (see: Tyreek Hill and Davante Adams), Metcalf would be an obvious trade candidate if they want to launch into a full rebuild.
At the NFL owners meetings, Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll and GM John Schneider maintained they were interested in locking Metcalf up.
“We intend for him to be with us,” Carroll said, per ESPN. “We’d love to figure that out. We’re in a normal kind of mode this time of the year. We’re not to that topic yet specifically because we’ve got so many other things going on. But we’d love to have him. There’s no way I could imagine playing without him.”
Schneider also said that their “intent” was to sign Metcalf to a long-term deal. But right now, their de facto starting quarterback is Drew Lock. Expecting to compete in the loaded NFC West seems like a tough ask, even if the Seahawks go after Baker Mayfield.
Adams and Hill both set the market for wide receiver contracts, each of them commanding an average value of nearly $30 million. Metcalf’s agent will likely want something close to that, which is a tough proposition for a rebuilding team with no quarterback.
“It is what it is now, right?” Schneider said of the increasing value for wide receivers. “This is the market. So we’ll get to that when we get to it. But yeah there is a bit of, ‘whoa,’ but then you have to figure out: OK, well, where’s the cap going? What’s it going to look like? How do you build your team? We do that every day, we’re constantly moving stuff around.”
The Seahawks previously floated Tyler Lockett as a potential trade piece, but Metcalf is five years younger, and theoretically a team wouldn’t have to extend him right away. The Seahawks could have him play under the final year of his rookie contract, but they risk losing him for nothing in 2023 and only reaping the benefits of his play in a season when they aren’t expected to contenders in their own division.
It’s been a wild offseason and with the smoke around Metcalf starting to gather, a trade shouldn’t shock anyone at this point.
