INDIANAPOLIS — Just 13 days ago, Seahawks general manager John Schneider and the rest of the team’s coaches, players and execs were being feted as they paraded through the streets of Seattle following a Super Bowl win.
Schneider and much of the rest of the team’s brain trust were at the NFL scouting combine Tuesday, back to the heavy lifting of attempting to keep as much of that team together as possible to make another run at a Super Bowl title in 2026.
“Here we go; we’re moving,” Schneider said of having to turn the page quickly to another season.
Schneider said he plans to meet here this week with agents of all of the Seahawks’ potential unrestricted free agents — a group that includes Super Bowl MVP running back Kenneth Walker III, cornerbacks Josh Jobe and Riq Woolen, rush end Boye Mafe, receiver Rashid Shaheed and safety Coby Bryant.
Schneider said the meetings with agents at the combine have increasingly become “everybody’s starting point” for negotiations and that he and other Seahawks scouts will try to assess the market this week and get back to Seattle on Sunday and begin formulating how it may unfold at each position.
“We’re down here trying to talk to everybody and get a feel for what the spring is going to look like,” he said of the free agent negotiating period beginning March 9.
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Schneider made clear what the goal is.
“Obviously we’d love to have everybody (back),” he said. “You want to have everybody back. Right when you get done with something special like that you’re like, ‘Let’s run it back, let’s run it back.'”
If only it were that simple.
While the Seahawks have plenty of cap space on paper — just over $58.6 million as of Tuesday according to OvertheCap.com — there are plenty of big-ticket items on the docket and that money could go quickly.
Asked specifically about trying to keep a defense that was the best in the NFL this year together while signing the likes of Walker and Shaheed, Schneider said: “It’s gonna be a challenge. It’s gonna be a challenge to figure this year’s puzzle out. I mean, these guys are — it’s a really cool team, and they’re all special. They’re all special people. So gonna try to retain as many of those guys as we possibly can.”
Schneider said the broader goal is to retain as competitive and connected of a 70-man roster — meaning, the 53-man active roster and 17-man practice squad — as possible within the goal of signing individual players.
Schneider mentioned the 70-man roster specifically when asked a question about Walker.
“We’d love to have Ken back,” Schneider said. “And he knows this better than anybody, it’s about our 70 and our collective and what that’s going to look like and we’ll have those meetings down here where we start talking to all the agents and we’ll have a better feel where we are going here toward the end of the week.”
ESPN reported last week that the Seahawks are unlikely to use a franchise or transition tag on Walker to keep him under contract for the 2026 season.
The franchise tag would mean a guaranteed salary for Walker in 2026 of $14.5 million, the transition tag $11.7 million.
Schneider said with a smile he wouldn’t answer specifically what the Seahawks might do in terms of tags and Walker.
“That’s a good try,” he said with a laugh. “… I couldn’t hear you.”
The tag deadline is March 3, and it, of course, does the Seahawks little good to box themselves in publicly to a decision either way before that date passes.
The Seahawks have used a franchise tag only twice since Schneider took over in 2010, one reason it’s been regarded all along as something the team likely won’t do with Walker.
Each side would prefer a long-term agreement that keeps Walker with the team for a few years and doesn’t mean he plays next season with the possibility of becoming a free agent the following year again.
It was announced in January that Walker changed representation and is represented by veteran agent David Canter of Aura Sports Group.
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Schneider noted he’s done plenty of deals with Canter through the years — notably, signing DeMarcus Lawrence as a free agent last season — and said that change won’t alter the negotiations.
Some have also wondered if the Seahawks will feel more urgency to re-sign Walker because of the knee injury suffered by Zach Charbonnet in the divisional playoff win over the 49ers on Jan. 18. Charbonnet, who split time with Walker during the regular season, had surgery to repair an ACL tear last week.
Schneider said he couldn’t give a timeline on Charbonnet, but a usual recovery period for such an injury is 9-to-10 months.
Asked how the dynamics of Walker’s contract situation changed over the last month of the season because of Charbonnet’s injury and Walker winning MVP honors, Schneider said: “You have to look at the whole picture. I mean he finished strong; he was having a great season. Both of those guys were having a really good season, so it was really a huge bummer for Zach you know especially at that time of the year and where we were in the process, it was just sad. But Ken did a great job stepping forward, obviously we relied heavy on him the last several games and he came through.”
What the Seahawks have to factor in is what deals may look like for receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba and cornerback Devon Witherspoon, members of the rookie class of 2023 who are eligible for extensions.
Smith-Njigba said in an interview with WFAA-TV in Dallas last week he feels he deserves to be the highest-paid player at his position, meaning potentially a deal worth more than $40 million a year.
Witherspoon may likewise command a deal approaching $30 million a year.
While each is under contract for 2026, extensions could change their cap hits for next season — and overall cash spending — and those numbers could influence how the Seahawks approach things with current free agents.
“It’s been part of our planning process,” Schneider said of extensions for Smith-Njigba and Witherspoon. “The timing of it, I’m not sure.”
What Schneider indicated is off the table for now is an extension for quarterback Sam Darnold.
Darnold signed a three-year deal with the Seahawks last March. The Seahawks have long had a policy of not giving extensions to players who have more than a year remaining on their contracts.
Some have wondered if Darnold’s success this season could make the Seahawks reconsider that stance.
But Schneider said no, responding: “Sam signed a three-year deal” when asked about potentially extending Darnold now and reiterating when asked a follow-up “there’s three years.”
The Seahawks hoping to retain as many players as possible is a goal not only for what those players can do on the field, but because Schneider said the team wants to try to sustain what everyone felt was a unique chemistry that developed in this year’s locker room.
Schneider said “I don’t think so” when asked if it’d be hard to replicate that feeling again in 2026.
“Even in the locker room, at the parade, they’re all talking about next year,” he said. “It’s just cool. There’s a great mix of veteran leadership, dogs, young dogs, athletes, speed and then guys that are willing to buy into development and their coaches and the people in the building that are supporting them.”
Bob Condotta: bcondotta@seattletimes.com. Bob Condotta is a sports reporter at The Seattle Times who primarily covers the Seahawks but also dabbles in other sports. He has worked at The Times since 2002, reporting on University of Washington Husky football and basketball for his first 10 years at the paper before switching to the Seahawks in 2013.